


All That Glitters

by MB234



Category: American Gods (TV), American Gods - Neil Gaiman
Genre: Alcohol, Banter, Drinking, Eventual Smut, F/M, Flirting, Jack's Crocodile Bar, Rough Sex, Semi-Public Sex, Smut, Surly Leprechaun, Sweeney being a little shit, unprotected sex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-26
Updated: 2017-11-21
Packaged: 2018-11-19 04:57:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 43,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11306139
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MB234/pseuds/MB234
Summary: You were all too used to dive bars and the kinds of folks that hung out in them; namely the rot-gut swilling, fight starting types who got handsy after a few too many shots and were quick to stiff you on your tip in favor of just one more drink.That’s why you thought you could handle it when a surly hurricane of rage and resentment in the form of one towering, thickly muscled flame haired male sauntered briskly into the dimly lit doors of Jack’s Crocodile Bar, your relatively new place of employment. The scathing look that your boss, the steely eyed, strong backed bar owner Jack flashed your way had you hastily second guessing your lofty notions of pub mastery.The words she drawled to you in that low sweet mid-west accent, and her crimson painted finger nails that curled around your t-shirt clad shoulder in a gesture of commiseration, didn’t do anything to help.“That right there is trouble, plain as the day is long,” Jack said, following your line of sight to the immense glowering ginger currently slouching in the sticky vinyl of a dingy booth that sat a few strides from the dentine bar, “And he just sat down in your section.”The Other Time Mad Sweeney Lost His Lucky Coin





	1. Vol I

Chapter One: Southern Comfort, Tired Eyes and a Bleeding Heart

 

 

 

 

You were all too used to dive bars and the kinds of folks that hung out in them; namely the rot-gut swilling, fight starting types who got handsy after a few too many shots and were quick to stiff you on your tip in favor of just one more drink.

 

That’s why you thought you could handle it when a surly hurricane of rage and resentment in the form of one towering, thickly muscled flame haired male sauntered briskly into the dimly lit doors of Jack’s Crocodile Bar, your relatively new place of employment. The scathing look that your boss, the steely eyed, strong backed bar owner Jack with her trigger happy fingers that were always ready to kick a drunken patron out, and that strangely comforting mom-that-takes-zero-shit attitude , flashed your way had you hastily second guessing your lofty notions of pub mastery.

 

The words she drawled to you in that low sweet mid-west accent, and her crimson painted finger nails that curled around your t-shirt clad shoulder in a gesture of commiseration, didn’t do anything to help.

 

“That right there is trouble, plain as the day is long,” Jack said, following your line of sight to the immense glowering ginger currently slouching in the sticky vinyl of a dingy booth that sat a few strides from the dentine bar, “And he just sat down in your section.”

 

She wished you a genuine but playful good luck as you sighed, slipping the notepad from your back pocket and snatching your pen from where it was tucked behind your ear, straightening the curve of your spine and tugging at the already low cut of your t shirt for good measure.

 

You could tell that he meant to fuck with you as soon as he laid eyes on your nearing form. There was something positively _wicked_ glinting in his gaze as it swept from the top of your head down the curve of your waist, the swell of your hips, all the way to the scuffed vans gracing your tired feet. By the time that aphotic gaze of his snapped back up to yours you had your best poker face firmly in place, the charming smile that had always earned you so much extra in tips valiantly curving your chap stick stained lips.

 

“Are you on the menu tonight, love?” He asked before you could even open your mouth to speak, the gentle accent lilting about his words sounding almost Irish, though it was soft, diluted, “Because I have a feeling you’d taste delicious.” He grinned up at you, pearly white teeth glinting with sharp predatory focus, though you could reluctantly admit that the smile curving his lips and the glint in his eyes were grudgingly handsome.

 

“Even if I was, you definitely couldn’t afford me,” you shot back at him without missing a beat, fervently batting away the heated things that his answering smile did to your fluttering heart, trying hard to ignore the fact that his eyes, which from far away had seemed black, were actually a deep, fathomless green, calling to mind fertile rolling hills that broke hard and fast on jagged cliff faces and the fervent sapping of ancient, effervescent springtime.

 

He sat back and regarded you with blatant appreciation, the kind that until now he had reserved for his sloppily disguised peaks at your ass, which looked admittedly fantastic in the tight blue jeans you had scraped on today, but that emotion directed not just at your body, but at _you_ , had something warm and traitorously flattered sparking fervently in your belly.

 

“It’s about right, that is,” he drawled in that accented voice as he pointed a ring bedecked finger incriminatingly in your direction, stalwart accusation sitting heavy in the gesture, flashing heatedly in his gaze, “I really shouldn’t get involved with women like you.”

 

“Women like me?” You tensed as your heart sputtered in your chest, no real offense thrumming behind your words despite the acridness of your tone. Still you tensed, anticipating the worst, though for all the mirth glinting in his forest green eyes you could detect no hints of anger or intent to harm. Perhaps he hid it well.

 

“Oh aye,” A smug smile curved those infuriatingly inviting lips of his, revealing those white teeth that glinted like alabaster in the bar’s low light and the tip of his wet tongue for your contritely hungry gaze, “Women with disaster on their lips, sensuality brimming on their hips and a pair of eyes so divine they can have a man running to them with the crook of their little finger. Sound familiar?”

 

You were left momentarily speechless as your lips parted in disbelief and your brow flew skyward in shock, though after a few heartbeats you shakily recovered, attempting to mask your stunned silence with the slight clearing of your throat and the propping of one elbow in the dip of your waist.

 

“Not at all,” you replied in a voice so sweet it could give him a cavity, laying the charm on thick as you leaned a hip against the scuffed table, “Though you sound like you speak from experience. Has your poor little heart been broken by one of these wild women?”

 

The look that he flashed you was filled with so much poorly disguised hurt, so much barely contained anguish and heart ache and _history_ , that you immediately bit your tongue, stowing the customary sarcasm in favor of a more genuine smile and a contrite peek at him through your lashes. You didn’t miss the tension roiling in his broad shoulders, crackling in his clenched hands, his tightly shut jaw, and you fervently made a mental note not to pluck that particularly raw nerve again.

 

“Women like me can be real heartless,” you murmured in an attempt to smooth over the mental harm you’d unfairly doled out to him, and you were immensely relieved when after a few heartbeats the anger sizzling in his veins seemed to fizzle out and his fingers unclenched one by one. It seemed strangely difficult to drag your eyes from the long lines of his shoulders, from the strong coil of muscle seated there, but finally you looked away, the reluctant action mostly spurred by the sheer guilty carnality of his strength.

 

“Oh but it’s worth it, love,” he said, a sad sort of tilt to the smile that curved his lips, though happy memories seemed to spark behind his eyes like wildfire as they met yours, “Every damned heart breaking minute.”

 

For a moment you let yourself imagine what those women had done to hurt him, who they had been, and morbidly, if you were anything like them. Sure, your lips had never been called disastrous per se, nor your hips cited as brimming with sensuality, but you had been known to enjoy the ensnaring of a man here and there, and the stringing of a willing male along until he was begging to either marry you or forget you. But that you evasively chalked up to low entry and high upkeep standards, no blame falling on your hips, let alone your lips.

 

“And somehow I just keep finding them,” the redheaded stranger said, peering up at you from beneath the lank shock of his crimson hair, it’s shaved sides and unkempt crown somehow suiting him quite well despite the ancient smolder of his gaze. You watched, equal parts spellbound and amused as he dipped one muscle packed shoulder and canted his head in what could be interpreted as a bow of sorts, “Sweeney, I’m called. Mad Sweeney.”

  
You raised a slender brow in disbelief at him as you watched him grin knowingly and after a moment in which he didn’t admit that he was kidding you dipped your head in acknowledgement, scoffing as you provided your own moniker and added, “Your mother must have really hated you to name you that.”

 

“Aye, something of that ilk.”

 

The grin that he flashed you in answer had something primeval ringing in the back of your mind in alarm, a danger warning of sorts, the kind you imagined you’d get if you were staring into an oncoming storm or standing on the edge of a precipice. It shouted things like _danger_ as it slipped down your spine, knotted in your stomach, quavered on your fingers, and whispered something that sounded like _run_ as it hastened your breaths.

 

You shook your head slightly to dispel those ridiculous notions of peril from your mind, breathing in deeply as you shifted, gripping your pen more firmly in your slightly sweating fingers.

 

“Something to drink then, to forget about that awful name?”

 

You teased him, trying to lighten the suddenly stifling mood, a soft sincere smile curving your lips as you gazed expectantly at him. You were pleased when he grinned in answer and slid his untouched menu towards you with the ring bedecked fingers of one hand, pulling out a sloppily rolled cigarette and pack of matches from the pocket of his jacket with the other.

 

“Southern comfort and Coke will have to do, since you’re not on the menu tonight, love.”

 

You shrugged, feeling brazen and flattered by all this talk of sensual hips, and you flirtatiously worried your bottom lip with intentional sensuality before you replied in a voice that was all husk and heat, “Never say never, Sweeney. You keep sweetening the pot with these charming words and you just might be able to afford me.”

 

You winked at him before snatching the menus from his lank fingers, delighting in the molten heat banked in his gaze as he regarded you, in the intensity seated there that had something warm and fervent sizzling in your chest as you wondered when the hell your fake flirting had turned into very real banter. As you strode away you just barely caught the harsh scrape and low smolder of a struck match as he lit his cigarette and watched  your retreating form, that aphotic gaze of his no doubt clinging to the admittedly luscious curves of your ass.

 

You couldn’t give the implications of that tantalizing stare much more thought though as without warning a gaggle of map clutching, visor bedecked customers burst into the bar, buzzing like angry bee’s as they made themselves at home in the numerous vacant scuffed vinyl booths and worn wooden tables.

 

The next hour saw you swept up in the rush orders and urgent bathroom cleanups as the uncharacteristically huge crowd poured unceremoniously into the bar for lunch, the customized t shirts and neon hats that many in the group sported unabashedly marking them as tourists. As you toiled over yet another Long Island Iced Tea, wondering fervently what the hell they were even _seeing_ out here this far from civilization, cursing each and every one of these fanny pack toting douches, you abruptly realized that you had long forgotten that Southern Comfort and Coke in the ensuing insanity of the uncharacteristic lunch rush. You gasped and whirled around towards the now empty booth as your heart twisted in your chest in panic, catching Jack’s eye as she plunked down a newly emptied drink tray and reached for a rag to wipe down the sodden counter with.

 

“Don’t worry doll I took care of that Southern Comfort a while ago, you got slammed by these spandex loving tourists,” she gestured towards the numerous occupied tables in your section with the upwards tilt of her slim chin before her dark gaze fixed on you, a knowing glint flashing in the older woman’s eye, filling you with the sudden urge to fidget. “But Irish Spring over there left you a tip before he split. It’s generous by the looks of it. He must have liked you.”

 

You murmured your fervent thanks to Jack, steadfastly ignoring the premonitory tinge thrumming just below her teasing tone, and made a mental note to pick up a few extra tables out of gratitude. Trying hard not to seem too eager, you hastily made for his abandoned table, your eye catching on something that glinted dully in the low light as you neared, an inviting flash of buffed metal sitting atop worn leather and scuffed, stained wood.

 

Your brow furrowed as your fingers ghosted over a single coin, wrought out of what looked like real gold and stamped with symbols that you couldn’t identify. As soon as the pads of your fingers grazed the metal your mind was filled with images of rolling hills incrementally broken by craggy outcroppings of rock, decorating the landscape like a quarried crown, of songs sung so long ago they were utterly forgotten, though their whispered melodies made a fierce ache erupt in your chest nonetheless. Though the alloy was cold, touching it made a fervent warmth bloom without warning within your breast, had a fire roaring to life somewhere near your heart and a rogue smile tugging at your lips of its own accord, for you knew that this token had been given out of a small measure of fondness, and a hearty measure of mischief.

 

Your smile only widened as you spied the receipt tucked covertly under the leather bound check holder. Sprawled on the bottom of the slip of thin vellum, black ink stark against snowy white paper, was one small sentence explaining the perplexing gift glinting in your palm.

 

_To ‘sweeten the pot’ just a bit more…_

 

 

A delighted giggle nearly slipped from your lips as you read the hastily scrawled words, and you couldn’t stem the affection that sizzled in your chest then, despite all the warnings you’d received about him, and all the damning stories you’d heard over the past few weeks. Because, for all his exaggerated swagger and infuriating bravado, this gift had, in fact, sweetened the pot.

 

And you weren’t entirely sure how many more saccharine gifts you’d need before you were completely his.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello Lovely Readers!
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this first chapter! I'm planning on making this a quick 3 chapter ficlet that explores Mad Sweeney and his various adventures, namely what would happen if he lost that tricky coin of his well before he ever met Shadow Moon. 
> 
> I sincerely hope that you enjoyed, there will be more coming very soon! If you have any thoughts, comments or concerns please voice them in the comments below! Thanks!
> 
> BTW I post mood boards on most of my fics, so I made one for this chapter as well! If you're interested in checking it out just follow the link below! Thanks!
> 
> http://imagines-oneshots-blog.tumblr.com/post/162264014174/all-that-glitters-chapter-one-southern-comfort


	2. Vol II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello Lovely Readers!
> 
> I hope you enjoy this first chapter! I'm planning on making this a quick 3 chapter ficlet that explores Mad Sweeney and his various adventures, namely what would happen if he lost that tricky coin of his well before he ever met Shadow Moon. 
> 
> I sincerely hope that you enjoy, there will be more coming very soon! If you have any thoughts, comments or concerns please voice them in the comments below! Thanks!

Chapter Two: Rye Whiskey, Bloody Knuckles and Sharp Tongues

 

 

 

 

He was following you.

 

 _Him_. Sweeney, the towering redhead with the fast smile and fresh bruises that had sat at your bar not even a fortnight ago. You’d noticed the lumbering shadow clinging to your heels just a few days earlier, but Lord only knew how long he’d actually been tailing you.

 

The first thing to alert you that something was off had been the unusually large size of your tips as of late. While you could admit that it was very hard to top a seemingly ancient, no doubt priceless gold coin noncommittally presented as a show of stewardship gratuity, every single one of your customer’s proprietary leavings this past week had been well over the customary twenty percent mark. After a remarkably huge fifty percent tip delivered at the tail end of your insane Wednesday lunch shift in which you’d bagged nearly a thousand bucks in tips alone you’d raced out of the Crocodile in somewhat delighted confusion, incriminatingly thick wad of twenty dollar bills clutched in your vicelike grip, your heart pounding with elation, intent on cornering the uncharacteristically generous customer, a sleazy looking dude in his late thirties who wore way too much hair gel and old spice, and demanding to know what the hell you’d done to earn such a gigantic gift.

 

You were frozen in your tracks by the sight of Sweeney himself slipping from some shadowed corner tucked around the back of the bar to descend mercilessly on the seedy guy that had served as your table twelve this past hour, surprise and no small amount of apprehension making you still as you watched his huge fists curl around the scuffed leather of the guys jacket and the thick muscles of his biceps work as he hauled the squirming man unceremoniously off his feet. Sweeney pressed the slimy guy none so gently into the beat up, once cherry red Volkswagen Rabbit that seemed to serve as his ride, a stark reminder that there was no way a guy like that could afford to tip you so lavishly.

 

“Where the hell is it, you piece of shite?”

 

Sweeney’s lilting accent had the last word of his threatening question twisting as it fell from his grimacing lips, the dark curse hastily shaping itself into a gilded weapon that had the guy flinching hard as it broke over him, the word somehow so much more intimidating in venomously spat, Irish-tinged English. The greasy guy at the end of Sweeney’s fists seemed to agree with you, because the small urgent sound that escaped from his agape mouth was closer to a whimper than an angry huff.

 

“What the hell, man! I have no idea what the fuck you’re talking about!”

  
“Don’t play games with me you mangy cocktrough,” Sweeney growled out, and though the dirty implications of his colorful curses would have made you laugh under normal circumstances, the rage running rampant in Sweeney’s eyes and the imposing roil of his immense muscles thoroughly convinced you that at the present it was much more wise to stay silent, “I’ll have back what’s mine, even if I have to knock out every one of your goddamned teeth to get it.”

 

“Come on man,” the guy whimpered, looking pitifully close to tears as he shook his head vehemently, his body contorting as he vainly tried to twist from beneath Sweeney’s imposing fists, ”I don’t know what you’re talking about, I don’t even know you, how could I steal from you?”

 

As you briefly wondered if he was telling the truth, if you should step in and help with whatever _this_ was, you firmly concluded that judging by his mousy tone and the fact that he looked about ready to piss himself this poor guy’s pathetic insistences were in fact true, and after a heartbeat in which Sweeney breathed hard and fast, his huge chest heaving and knotted muscles working, the hotheaded Irishman seemed to arrive at an identical conclusion.

 

“Alright you fucker, get the fuck out of here.”

 

The guy all but wept when Sweeney released his ironclad hold on the slip of faux leather and ripped cotton that had been trapped between his fingers, shoving the guy away with blatant contempt as he raked a split knuckled hand over his wiry unkempt beard, “You don’t come back here for a long fucking time. And you don’t even as much as _think_ about that waitress in there or I’ll rip your fucking heart out.”

 

That last comment of his had you starting hard in a strange mixture of both jagged alarm and reluctant delight, though it was tinged with something closer to flattery than apprehension. What the hell could that cryptic warning, one that the gelled up, leather clad bar patron seemed intent on obeying as the tires of his shitty Rabbit pealed out of the gravel strewn parking lot, possibly fucking mean?

 

You’d carefully and quietly closed the door behind you, using the screeching of the car’s wheels to cover the rusty swing of the ragged hinges, and backed into the bar with about as much grace as a newborn calf, heartily shaken to your core. In response to Jack’s insistent ponderings about your wellbeing you’d cited a direly needed bathroom break and ducked into the ladies room, using the rare stolen moments of alone time to swipe cold water over your flushed skin and smooth back your hair, fervently pushing away the icy apprehension and molten curiosity that fought for purchase in your chest, alternating between thoughts tinged with panic and plans inspired by inquisitiveness. It had taken you a handful of minutes to get yourself together enough to make it outside and finish up your shift.

 

As the days had ticked slowly by and you’d taken note of the surly shadow trailing your every move, you’d been able to add a new emotion to the plethora of feelings battling in your breast; _anger_.

 

Who the hell did he think he was to tail you like this, to disrupt your life and intrude upon your privacy? You had nothing to offer him besides some drinks and casual conversation, the likes of which he could find at any other dive bar in Indiana currently employing a half-decent looking barista. Besides, it wasn’t like you were going to put out for him, not that easily anyway. He’d have to hit up the Hooter’s down the street, or better yet the strip club over by Costco’s for that kind of action.

 

That aggravating unanswered question was the exact reason that even now, as you studiously got ready for a much needed night out, you were _still_ stuck on the perplexing fact that he seemed to be set on you for some unknown, likely mischievous purpose. Applying a second coat of mascara to your already primly fluffed lashes, the gentle hum of your newly working radiator barely audible above the music pouring from your phone across the room, you allowed yourself a brief moment of purely girlish delight as you remembered the comely ripple of his muscles, the gritty growls that erupted from those tantalizing lips, the wild glint in those aphotic eyes. A stalker he may be, but at least he was a damn fine one.

 

Speaking of your suddenly not-so-shitty radiator, that was the second thing that had you feeling like there was something bigger going on here, like there was something _off_. Every little broken, rundown and busted to hell thing in your dirt cheap apartment suddenly seemed to fix itself. That stopped up drain in your tub that absolutely refused to unclog? Finally taken care of with an extra dose of drain-o. That creepy dude a few doors down who liked to not-so accidentally walk his cat every time you stepped out onto your porch for some sun? Moved out. Those obnoxious upstairs neighbors that insisted on rearranging their furniture at two in the morning? Suddenly quiet. You were sleeping like a baby these days; so well, in fact, that tonight you were deciding to actually go out after your Friday shift instead of collapsing in a Netflix fueled haze of clumsily rolled spliff smoke and your finest sweatpants.

 

No, tonight you were dressed up to the nines; your hair was loose and left to sweep about your shoulders, you were clad in a black halter top with straps so thin they were barely visible against your bare skin  and a silky skirt that moved about your thighs as though it was reluctant to break contact with your skin, and on your feet were strappy sandals featuring just this slightest heel - enough to elongate your legs, but not so much that your feet would be killing you by the end of the night. Completing your killer ensemble was a coat of deep maroon lip gloss to match the lingerie laying in wait beneath your clothing and glinting earrings decorating your multiple piercings. With a slight fluff of your hair and a pout of your full lips you were off, calling one of the small fleet of Uber’s actually available in this Podunk town to take you to your destination.

 

You were supposed to meet a girlfriend for drinks at a bar very far away from Jack’s and its charming but exhausting ambiance, though you had slight doubts about whether or not she would actually show. She was just getting into the whole online dating scene, and she’d happily take any chance that came her way at getting laid, even if it meant ditching plans with her friends.

 

Not that you could blame her, you yourself hadn’t gotten a good lay in far too long. This sad truth was highlighted by the fact that even as you entered the unfamiliar bar and made a beeline for the crowded counter you still searched for that customary shock of lank crimson or even a flash of roiling muscles in the undulating crowd from the corner of your eye. Could he still be considered a stalker if you welcomed, hell even longed for, his presence?

 

Thankfully you didn’t have to answer your own internal ponderings as you promptly ordered a whiskey neat, a double after the long day you’d had, and flashed your I.D. to the handsome, man bun toting bartender behind the counter. If you’d been anyone else you supposed you would be flattered to have been carded, and with a smile nonetheless, but being a waitress and a moonlighting bartender yourself you knew all the tricks, including the one where you check the I.D. to get all the info upfront about a hot chick at your bar you were trying to bag. You supposed he would do if you got drunk enough, but in all honesty you had a more irksome, flame haired hothead on your mind at the present.

 

As the minutes slipped by and your friend became more and more late you began to heartily suspect that you’d be drinking alone tonight. As you sipped at your whiskey you mused that you weren’t even really that upset; you would have been thoroughly distracted anyway. You kept glancing at the door every few minutes, and it sure as hell wasn’t her you were hoping would stride into the room, tall and handsome and bearing all sorts of trouble. No, it was your perplexing Irishman with his russet hair, impossibly green eyes and rage filled chest that your gaze searched for, your fingers raising that dwindling glass of whiskey to your red stained lips in placation with each moment that passed without him.

 

God, it was pathetic, wasn’t it – how much you wanted to see him?

 

Plunking down your glass, you gestured to the bartender for another and promptly threw that one back as soon as it was poured, instructing the long haired hottie to keep your tab, and your seat, open as you slipped off to the ladies room.

 

Just as you reached the isolated hallway that housed your intended porcelain throne your phone chimed loudly at your side, and you paused just outside of the empty restroom to dig it out of your purse. Before you could swipe your code across the dimly lit screen you felt a looming presence make itself known at your back and started straight out of your skin when you heard a familiar accented voice crooning heatedly in your ear.

 

“She’s not coming, lassie. All the better, cause you and me have got some unfinished business that needs attending.”

 

Before you could register the wicked shivers that tripped down your spine in response to his low urgent voice and the casual presentation of his eerie preternatural knowledge that a single downwards glance at the message waiting patiently in your inbox could confirm, you were being moved bodily from the hallway and into the vacant bathroom by the massive hands that he had curled around your waist. Your senses whirled as your feet found solid ground once more and the clunky wooden door to the claustrophobic space was shut and locked behind you.

 

You firmly banished his searching hands that lingered on your body with a surety that you didn’t feel resounding within you as you caught your breath, trying valiantly to stamp out the fervent lust that ran rampant through your veins at his closeness, at his sheer undiluted masculinity and hulking size. He was bigger than you remembered, nearly seven feet of solid muscle and barely contained rage, and it all seemed to be concentrated on you.

 

You shivered anew to remember the anger, and the threats of face pummeling blows, that he’d intimidated the Crocodile’s patrons with, and suddenly you wondered if he meant to harm you now, with you securely out of the public eye and all to himself.

 

Dimly you recognized that behind the hot ire sparking in his eyes there was something else seated there, something strangely reassuring, something just as molten but noticeably less sharp, undulating like a spark of ancient fevered vernality, awakening an answering jolt of heat, of pure feminine want deep within your belly.

 

“You have something of mine, lassling, something very special, something wrought of precious metal,” This close to him you could make out flecks of something golden and purely stannic shocking through his irises, something that called to mind gilded crowns and lofty thrones of power, of battles clashing in ancient winters and great wars waged for equally great hordes of treasure, “And I intend to get it back this very night.”

 

You struggled hard to focus on his words instead of the way his mouth curved so invitingly to form them, thoroughly distracted by the thick coils of muscle roiling in his shoulders, in his arms and rippling down his torso as he stood so close to your heartily curious fingers. You ran an itching hand through your hair as you blinked hard, mentally urging your fingers to clutch at the cool tile and smooth porcelain at your back instead of searching for purchase in the hard muscles of his chest like they so obviously longed to. After a tense moment in which your dual laboring breaths slowed and you met each other’s eyes with matching stubborn expressions you recovered enough to flick your hair over one bare shoulder and roll your eyes in a show of contempt that you didn’t quite feel resounding in your chest, canting your head as you looked up at him.

 

“Gold?” you questioned, your brow furrowing with confusion, that whiskey starting to kick in, dulling some of the anger sitting acrid on your tongue and warming your already arousal flushed skin as you swayed gently on your feet, leaning harder against the sink at your back for support.

 

“Aye, gold,” Sweeney urged you, those scopic hands coming to rest on the smooth porcelain behind you as he leaned in, fingers spanning just beyond the dips of your waist, “I believe I left you such a token about a fortnight ago.”

 

Understanding sparked suddenly in your whiskey and lust dulled mind, distracting you from heated thoughts of just how those long fingers would feel slipping up your ribs, cupping your ass, spreading your thighs.

 

“It was a tip,” you supplied in answer, sarcasm and annoyance laying heavy and grating in your tone, successfully masking the arousal that threatened to show there as you glared up at him, wishing fervently that you didn’t want him as bad as you did, far too stubborn to admit any such thing aloud, “Generally you keep those.”

 

He flashed you a scathing look that was all mockery and sass, and you flashed him one right back in answer. You could practically _feel_ him physically resisting the urge to smash one huge hand into the mirror above your head in anger, and internally you credited him for his momentous restrain. He sighed before he spoke, the sound seeming to be called up from a place of pure weariness and heart breaking desperation.

 

“Have you noticed any increased luck lately, any unusual runs of glad happenstance?”

 

You paused, arduously shifting your gaze from where it had been firmly transfixed by the cords of his strong throat as you thought of your insanely generous tips and various fortuitous apartment repairs.

 

“Yeah, I have actually,” you murmured before you rattled off the various positive things that had happened in your life in the past two weeks, ending your list with an incriminating, “I also noticed you scaring the shit out of my customers outside of Jack’s earlier this week.”

 

“Aye, and I’m not going to apologize, they were scoundrels, all of them,” Sweeney replied, dismissing any of your remaining anger or confusion with the lofty wave of one huge hand, “Movin’ on to more pressing matters, did you ever stop to wonder why these good things happened to ya?” he asked, russet eyebrows lilting skyward, ring bedecked fingers tapping gently at chipped porcelain as he awaited his answer.

 

“No, I didn’t really ask questions when life finally decided to stop kicking me in the balls,” you snapped, the alcohol emboldening you, stealing away some of your tact and good sense and replacing it with searing attitude and a boatload of molten lust. Sweeney didn’t seem angry, like you’d expect, but rather amused, impressed almost, and you let the answering warmth from that incredible fact bloom hotly in your chest for just a moment before you attempted to bat it away.

 

“As you should,” Sweeney said softly after a few heartbeats of contemplative silence in which he smirked, one corner of his sinful lips tugging upwards in apparent impression, “Life makes a bastard and a thief of us all in the end, doesn’t it.”

 

You had no words for him then, nothing but the comfort of commiseration, so you settled for the gentle press of your palm into the wide slope of his shoulder instead, your breath hitching sharply in your throat as you felt the knotted muscles coiling there beneath your fingers jump as though he’d been shocked, as though that small gentle touch had been the last thing he expected.

 

After a moment in which your eyes met and a feeling of understanding, of something like the stuff of kindred spirits, passed between you and him, Sweeney shook his lofty head hard as if trying to clear it and focused back on his aim, raising one huge hand to direct a finger your way in mild accusation.

 

“The point is you have my coin, and I want it back.”

 

You didn’t really believe his sincerity as you caught the roiling green of his gaze, noted the strangely distracted anger that danced within them. You knew it was pushing your currently copious luck, toying with the fickle fates, but instead of caving and pulling out his coveted coin from its hiding place on your person you flicked the hair from your eyes, leaned forwards a measure to meet his gaze and slipped your hand from his shoulder to cross your arms in front of your chest.

 

“And if I said you can’t have it back?”

 

The look he flashed you in answer almost made you think he was glad you’d reacted like that.

 

“Oh, there are ways that I can make you talk, lassling,” he drawled as he took another step closer, closing the distance between your bodies so that he was almost flush against you, searing heat sizzling in his tone as he leaned in, making you press the small of your back more firmly into the sink behind you in a vain attempt to keep him securely in sight.

 

“You’d hit a girl?” you teased, one slender brow raising in a fierce taunt, utterly unable to stop the wicked smile that spanned your lips. Your heart twisted wildly in your chest at the grin that curved his tempting mouth in answer to your subtle challenge.

 

“Oh no, _mo_ _Éinín,_ ” he breathed, his breath rasping hotly against your skin, the wire of his thick beard just barely scratching your cheek as he husked at your ear, “It’s not violence I’m keenin’ for now.”

 

“You seem like the kind of guy that’s always _keen_ for violence,” you shot back, mocking his lilting accent playfully even as you craned your neck to grant him access to the sensitive flesh there and your addled brain screamed for his lips that were rasping so dangerously close to your skin.

 

“There is one thing in this wretched world that’s better than fighting, little lass,” Sweeney rumbled, those wicked fingers flitting impatiently against the silk of your top, tracing the band of your skirt, slipping the material against your flesh in a touch that was surprisingly light, agonizingly teasing.

 

“And what’s that?” you questioned, almost panting now, desperate for his touch, for his kiss, for _everything_.

 

“Fucking,” he answered in a tone that was more a low growl than a true pronunciation, but you couldn’t muster up the concentration to find that anything but all manner of hot as you moaned loudly, threading your fingers through his hair and tugging his mouth to yours at the very same moment that his urgent fingers found the soft skin of your bare thighs, his touch like pure lightning to your veins as you groaned wantonly against his mouth.

 

He was grunting low and wild into your kiss as you tugged at his russet strands, surprisingly soft as they slipped through your fingers, his hands pawing hard at your ass as he leaned down, never breaking his lips from yours, and picked you up into his arms, cradling you against the hard slip of his body for just a moment before he balanced you precariously on the sink. The appliance felt relatively sturdy beneath you, and you trusted it to hold your weight, needed it to, because you didn’t want to think about anything else at that moment other than the blissful feel of his hot lips moving urgently on yours, the heated press of his long fingers as they parted your thighs, wrapped your legs around his waist, and the stout coil of his strong muscles that roiled beneath your seeking palms that were sweeping hungrily across his broad back.

 

“Sweeney,” you groaned as those deft fingers skated up the taught lines of your spread thighs to cup the soaking lace of your panties, long digits sweeping down your cloth covered sex, playing at the wetness pooling there.

 

“Slicker than waterweed for me,” he husked against your mouth, appreciation drenching his tone as he nibbled hard at your bottom lip, his hot tongue sweeping contritely behind the dull bite of his teeth to soothe some the raggedness they left in their path. You smiled brashly into your kiss when, without ceremony, he pulled aside the sodden material of your panties and groaned low and long to find you shaved completely bare, your sex wet and aching and ready for him, though that vixens smile was thoroughly banished from your lips when he swept those digits against your cunt expertly, sliding them slowly up through your wet folds to circle lazily around the tight bud of your clit.

 

“Got to get you ready for me,” Sweeney groaned as he began to slip one finger into your tight heat, the slide of his digit slow and languorous, as if he wanted to feel every damn inch of you. Through the thick fog of lust and lethargic haze of pleasure clouding your mind you skeptically wondered just how big Sweeney thought he was that he’d need to prepare your weeping sex to take his shaft. Curiosity dominating your actions, your seeking mouth moving to nip at the cords of his neck, you let one hand explore the muscles rippling beneath his sweat slicked, half unbuttoned shirt, pressing and groping appreciatively before sliding down the waistband of his pants to grab the steely hardness aching between his strong thighs, and immediately you were thanked by his lusty gravel filled groans of pleasure, duly impressed by the sheer size of the manhood you felt throbbing against your hand.

 

“Ah fuck, I’m hard as a goddamned rock for you little lass,” Sweeney groaned, one brawny forearm coming to rest beside your head as he braced a hand on the mirror behind your head, a low moan slipping from his parted lips in response to the urgent press of your hot palm against his impressive length, his wicked groans no doubt further spurred by the deft ministrations of the fingers of your other hand as they struggled to fully unclasp his pants, which strangely seemed not to possess a zipper but instead a complex series of buttons, “And I know my fucking rocks.”

 

You giggled against his hot skin as your hungry mouth traveled up the length of his thick neck, the small part of your mind that wondered what the hell he meant by that thoroughly overshadowed by the louder, more insistent part that was busy marveling at the silky smooth feel of his warm flesh beneath your tongue, at the expert slide of his long fingers in and out of your wet sex, the slow swirl of his thumb against your clit.

 

“Are you gonna keep talking about your rocks, Sweeney, or are you gonna fuck me?” you crooned in his ear, flicking out your teasing tongue to trace the curving line of cartilage there, breathless from the thick slide of his fingers in your pussy, voice just barely quavering from the heat that carnal touch spurred to bloom low in your body.

 

“My little lass knows what she wants,” Sweeney growled in your ear, the hand that had been curled around your thigh, spreading you open for him, snapping through the sex and sweat filled air to deliver a bruising slap to the large portion of your ass that hung off the sink, the wanton action sparking warm pleasure tinged pain to erupt against your skin, causing a shocked gasp to slip from your lips, “I _like_ that.”

 

Capturing your lips once more, slowly, mindfully slipping his long fingers from your aching sex, Sweeney hastily positioned your legs to wrap more fully around his waist with a gentleness that surprised you, and as you kissed long and slow you crossed your ankles at the small of his strong back, securing your hold on him as he slipped the silky material of your skirt up to your waist, braced both of his scopic hands on your hips and tilted your torso back. In this position you were balanced partly on the sink beneath you, partly against the wall at your back, but mostly on him, and you gratefully leaned into the warmth of his immense body as you finally undid the clasp of his pants and urgently slipped them halfway down his thick thighs. Immediately one of your hands found purchase in the cut muscles of his admittedly pert ass while the other wrapped around his sizeable shaft and pumped it once, twice, delighting in the pleasured groans that fell from his lips in response to your ministrations.

 

It was dumb really, letting him fuck you without a condom, but you were on the pill and you were at a safe time in your cycle, plus you were just so goddamn hot for him that you really didn’t think you could stop even if you wanted to, so without any further thought you lined up the crown of his glorious cock with your throbbing pussy and bit hard at his full bottom lip, pressing an urgent, spurring hand against the muscles roiling in his ass as he flexed his strong hips and sank blissfully inside you.

 

You panted hard against his lips as he bottomed out, huge shaft throbbing deep inside you, your sex aching as he filled you completely. It had been too damn long since you’d been properly fucked; you wanted more, you wanted it hard and fast and you wanted it _now._

 

“Sweeney,” you whined sharply, words failing on your trembling lips as you writhed in his arms, reveling in the warm musk of his sweat slicked skin, the low huffs of his breaths against your neck, the harshness of his fingers curled around your hips. He seemed to understand though, because in response he just chuckled and tightened his hold on you, murmuring _“I know what my little lassling wants,”_ and _“I’ve got you,_ _mo_ _Éinín,”_ against your skin.

 

He was still groaning out small encouragements and grated praises to you between the harsh huffs of his breaths as he began pistioning his hips at a dizzying speed, his delicious shaft pumping in and out of your sex so fast you could do nothing but mewl and moan and writhe in his arms, reveling in the grating sighs of his grunts at your neck, the perfect slip of the fingers he graciously worked against your clit, each wet slide sending jolts of pleasure spearing through your sex, and the merciless pounding of his shaft inside you. Each wicked sensation he relentlessly wrought from your pliant body pushed you higher, demanded more, stretched your wearing stamina to its breaking point.

 

When he sank his teeth into the taut muscle at the juncture of your shoulder, groaning out those urgent praises against your heated skin, sweeping that hot tongue against the dull imprints left by his sharp teeth at the same time that he caught your clit in a searing sweep of his fingers and plunged that thick shaft into your weeping sex just right you abruptly came undone, moaning his name wildly, panting and bucking against him as your sex greedily clenched his pulsing shaft, your body demanding so fiercely that he follow you down into the fiery depths of your pleasure that he could do naught but obey.

 

And obey he did, cumming hard and fast inside of you, curses in a language that sounded vaguely like Gaelic falling from his trembling lips as he gripped your thighs hard and rammed his stuttering hips into you once, twice, three times. He was grinding his teeth so hard against the soft skin at your nape that you knew you’d have a hickey there in the morning, but as you ran shaking fingers through his unkempt hair, slid them down his sweat slicked muscle packed back, whirled them over his strong stubble tinged jaw, you just couldn’t quite find the energy to give a damn.

 

For long moments after your scathing orgasm you slouched exhaustedly, half resting against him, half slumped against the wall, your ears ringing keenly and the arches of your feet tingling, your pussy throbbing out a dull satisfied oscillation from the strength of your powerful release, and even though you’d sworn up and down at the beginning of this night that you wouldn’t fuck him, you really couldn’t find too many things to complain about at the present.

 

You imagined that you felt a kind of peace here then, resting comfortably in his brawny arms, your pliant limbs flooding with post coital warmth, your pulse pounding faintly in your ears, and for a moment you imagined that Sweeney felt it too. Judging by the gentle repetitive sweep of his fingers against the bare skin of your thighs and the relaxed huffs of his slowing breaths at your neck, that rosy notion wasn’t just in your head.

 

“I can tell the kind of woman that you are, lassie. You’re not one for white bread and syllabub,” Sweeney said softly, his tone rough from all that growling and groaning, his melodic voice immensely comforting as it crooned in your ear, “No, you’d keep the kind of a tip I give close at hand,” he said, the abrupt subject change making your brow furrow as you slowly emerged from your post orgasmic reverie, your brain jolting awake as the fingers of one of his hands that had gripped your hips so firmly began skating up, tracing your ribs reverently, coming to rest just below the underwire of your lacy maroon bra, “In fact,  I don’t think you’d let such a bounty out of your sight.”

 

Without warning he tore aside the flimsy fabric covering your breasts and snatched the coin, his coin, from its clever hiding place inside your bra. You gasped, drawing in a stunned breath as you met his regaling gaze, shocked and surprised and just a bit incredulous that he’d deduced its location so easily. It was almost unnatural, the way he’d found it out, as if he could sense it there, as if he had always known exactly where it had been. The cogs of your mind were whirring now, the machinations of your imagination working, clumsily piecing together the faulty picture that his perplexing puzzle pieces painted.

 

“What the hell are you?” you gasped with a surprising amount of amusement sizzling in your veins, curving your parted lips as you surveyed the ancient, scuffed coin glinting proudly between his fingers, suspicion edging sharply at your mind, making you wonder in wanton revelry if getting into your proverbial pants hadn’t been this infuriating male’s goal from the very beginning.

 

You became aware then of your harsh breaths, ragged from exertion, your husky voice lilting with a heady mixture of wonder and exhausted beguilement, your skin flushed and thoroughly sweat slicked and your limbs tired and extraordinarily strung out. You knew the picture you made, skirt rumpled about your hips, panties pushed hastily aside, hair a mess about your shoulders, tripping down your back, but the look he shot you, the one filled with what could almost be interpreted as affection as it skated across your form, told you that he wouldn’t want you any other way than this. If he kept looking at you like that, as though you were the most spellbinding, intriguing woman in the world, you didn’t think you’d ever be able to muster the strength to get angry at him, even as you began to realize that he had absolutely no intention of answering your fervent questions. But that didn’t mean you were ready to let him win the war that easily.

 

“Men like you can be heartless also,” you quipped, harking back to your conversation so long ago in the dim light of the Crocodile, grinning at him despite yourself as you slowly righted your panties and fixed your skirt, eyeing him as you adjusted your askew bra in exaggerated movements. He had finished pulling himself together much quicker than you, and at your teasing words he paused his flagrant exit, his massive hand hovering above the handle to the door, one crimson brow raised as he glanced back at you, mischief glinting brightly behind his eyes, flashing eagerly in the corners of his naughty smile. You didn’t think that you’d ever, in all your mercifully long life, forget the picture he cut then; otherworldly knowledge gleaming in that ancient aphotic gaze, delight filled devilry playing at his brow, sharpening his cheekbones and honing his roguish grin.

 

“Oh love,” he crooned, gracing you with one more heated, appreciative sweep of his glinting eyes down your flushed form and a heart stopping wink that promised _so much more_ , “There are no other men like me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello Lovely Readers!
> 
> How about that for some smut?! What did we think of Sweeney - in character, too nice, too cuddly, not cuddly enough? Please share any and all thoughts that you have with me, I love your feedback! 
> 
> Thank you so much for reading! Your views and support are much appreciated! A few quick notes about some things in this chapter:
> 
> \- I'm fairly certain that "mo Éinín" means "my little bird" in old Gaelic - I thought that would be a super cute pet name  
> considering that Sweeney actually spent time as a bird, and likes to tell them to fuck off when they work for gods that  
> he isn't particularly fond of  
> \- Anyone catch the dating app reference that I threw in there? Could the reader's lusty friend have fallen victim to Bilquis?!  
> D:  
> \- Also, the reader's lucky day happens on a Wednesday - coincidence? Hmmm... ;)  
> \- ALSO, not an easter egg per se, but can anyone else hear Sweeney's accented voice grating "fuck" whenever it's typed  
> out here, because I can, and it's Messing with Me
> 
> Anywho, those are just some fun things I threw in there, hopefully you enjoyed them! A mood board for this chapter will be coming very soon, stay tuned! Thank you!
> 
> EDIT: Moodboard!
> 
> http://imagines-oneshots-blog.tumblr.com/post/162339286584/chapter-two-rye-whiskey-bloody-knuckles-and


	3. Vol III

Chapter Three: Sweet Cream, Sordid Ritual and Soft Skin

 

 

 

This was absolutely, without a doubt, the single most ridiculous thing you had ever done, and that was including the time you’d fucked a flame haired, thickly muscled surly stranger in the dingy bathroom of an Indiana bar.

 

 

The very same stranger that, incidentally, you sought this very night.

 

 

Soft milky rays of moonlight shimmered on the pale surface of the fresh cream splashing playfully within the limits of the bowl wedged precariously between your shaking fingers, your small hands warily brandishing the vessel resting within them with the utmost care as you shuffled laboriously from your kitchen to the window on the far side of your tiny living room. The alabaster liquid lapped at the edges of the ceramic vestibule it sloshed in as if it delighted in its intended purpose, as if it knew something that you didn’t.

 

 

You weren’t entirely sure why you were doing this. You weren’t even sure why the idea had occurred to you in the first place. After a sizzling heartbeat that sent blood slurring like acid through your veins, stalwartly crumbling the lie that had burrowed in your mind when you’d told yourself it was nothing more than a mild vendetta fueled quest to reclaim that infernal coin, and your luck along with it, you finally recognized that deep in your chest, somewhere near your hammering heart, it was more than that. It was hope.

 

 

Idiotic, insane, beautiful hope. It clung to your lashes, making them flurry with each fresh wave of nerves that skittered down your spine; it wound into your muscles, forcing your arms to outstretch as you placed the bowl gently, reverently, on the windowsill, squarely in a particularly nebulous patch of moonlight, and it had your breaths hastening as you considered the likelihood that your monolithic, infuriating Irishman, your _Leprechaun_ , would show.

 

 

You made yourself think the unfamiliar word, forced it’s foreignness to echo in your mind, though some part of you still rebelled at the absurdity of it _. Leprechaun’s don’t exist_ , your rational mind railed, brandishing a fitful finger from its lofty pedestal of logic and sense,  _and even if they somehow did_ ,  _they sure as shit wouldn’t look like Mad Sweeney._

 

 

 _But what if,_ the dreamer in you replied, gesturing grandly to the pile of library books stacked high on your rickety coffee table, each weighty tome bearing some variation of the words “Celtic” and “Myths” in their titles.

 

 

Still, as you slid the brimming bowl onto the chalky bricks by the window you got the insane sense then that what you were doing was utterly right, that it was  _good._  It felt like ancient tradition, like ceremony and celebration. It felt like ritual, and it burnt like holy fire down to your very marrow, setting you ablaze with the glory of sacrament.

 

You weren’t without religion in your life, you’d been raised Catholic, and though it hadn’t stuck you still remembered the feeling of church, of sin and guilt and burdensome contrition. But tonight was different, wilder, more feral somehow, and it left your distant memories of church feeling pitifully hollow. There was something of the old world in the air now, something of the ancient savage past, when the dark was still feared and the old gods walked the earth like giants. That barbaric feeling, that omnipresence, had the hair on the backs of your arms standing straight up and your skin tingling wickedly, the lush air that whispered fervently over your heated flesh nearly crackling with energy.

 

 

 

Tonight you’d get your luck, and your coin, back. Tonight, you summoned your Leprechaun.

 

* * *

 

 

_Somewhere (not too far away) in America_

 

 

“You did make a promise, you know. You entered into a compact and you must see it through, if only to reap all of the rich rewards.”

 

 

More like all of the glorious fucking headaches.

 

 

As he’d spoken one of Wednesday’s brimming celadon eyes had caught the dim light pouring out of the dingy dive bar propped up behind them, stretching over where they stood tucked in its precarious shadow, the amused expression on the old god’s face making Sweeney scowl and glare, prompting GrÍmnÍr to smirk and pretend to know far less than he did. When Sweeney swore he saw a fucking _glint_ sparkle in that unsettling, all-seeing eye as it fixed on him he firmly began to suspect that the plucky god _enjoyed_ fucking with him.

 

 

“Don’t fucking remind me of what we both know that I know,” Sweeney snapped, ruffling an unsteady hand through the rumpled hair at the crown of his head, skimming his fingers down one shaved side, hating how fucking _dumb_ he sounded when he was frightened. And Bran help him, he was not above admitting that the prospect of taking a life after all these years frightened him. There was a reason he had fled like a coward on the eve of battle so long ago, and it just happened to be the very same reason that had him standing here now, in the service of this Nordic son of a bitch, “You’re talking about cold blooded murder, which is pretty goddamned bad, even for a fucker like you.”

 

 

“On the contrary, my churlish friend, we are merely discussing the timely fulfillment of our compact,” Wednesday at least had the decency to look offended by the accusations of outright slaughter, though that wry indignant smirk still flitting about his wrinkled mouth firmly hinted at his undoubtedly ulterior motives, “However, ‘discussing’ might be too delicate a word for it.”

 

 

“Oh for fuck’s sake,” Sweeney growled as he dug a clumsily rolled cigarette from the pocket of his scuffed jean jacket, mostly to have something to distract his shaking fingers with, “Come right out and say it, you rancid cunt, you have me by my fine Irish balls and you know it. Now you want me to kill a girl for you - a girl who, by all your accounts, just might have it coming - but it’s still murder all the same. Shite still stinks no matter how much you may try to dress it up like a rose.”

 

 

Wednesday took a break from his blatant creepy eyeing of a clearly inebriated blond woman stumbling from the dingy drinking establishment, and the long slip of leg that her short skirt showcased, to flash him an almost confused look, raising one stooped shoulder and crooning, “So?”

 

 

Sweeney couldn’t fucking believe that he, of all people, was the voice of fucking reason in this twisted conversation.

 

 

“What is one mortal’s flimsy life to the likes of us?”

 

 

At the mention of mortals Sweeney couldn’t help his fevered thoughts that raced eagerly to the mortal currently occupying his guilt strewn mind, to _you_ , and although it was dangerous to think about you while in such clairvoyant company, Sweeney was glad that his thoughts hadn’t drifted to other, more painful memories.

 

 

 

What filled his mind instead were molten recollections of your silky thighs trembling beneath his seeking fingers, your cries of pleasure, pleasure he’d wrought from your pliant body, slipping like a saccharine prayer on his lips, of your little heels digging into his back, spurring him on, and of your eyes, just barely glinting with the wild fervor of belief as they’d clung to him.

 

 

 

Sniffing, trying to mask the hard on that grew insurgently in his trews at those heated thoughts and remembered lusts, Sweeney shifted his weight, though the desperate motion did nothing to lessen the ache he felt low in his hips, burning in his loins, a stark remnant of your salacious meeting.

 

 

 

He could still feel you deep in his bones, searing on his skin. Your fingers had been like razors as they’d raked down his back, your lips like a brand as they’d pressed into his collar bones, nipped at his neck. He didn’t think he’d ever been more glad to feel pain, to feel anguish and agony and sensation. To feel  _alive._

 

 

 

He'd tasted the future on your lips that night, ripe and real, and for just a moment it had been more satisfying than the past. For just a moment it had been sweeter than anything he’d ever sampled, and now he craved more with a fierceness that shocked him.

 

 

“I didn’t realize that the inevitableness of mortality made you all hot and bothered,” Wednesday’s knowing glance was all amusement and accusation as it flashed his way, in the general direction of his crotch, and Sweeney loathed the heat that flushed low on his neck in what was almost a show of embarrassment, “Duly noted.”

 

 

 

“Fuck off,” Sweeney muttered, flipping the god an indignant middle finger just as one of the deities accursed raven’s flitted down onto its masters trench coat clad shoulder. The winged rodent cawed loudly in Sweeney’s direction and actually seemed to glare at him in what could be interpreted as disdain. Sweeney bared his teeth and glared right back in answer.

 

 

 

“My pet’s aren’t overly fond of you,” Glad-O-War drawled casually, slipping a gnarled finger over the smooth oily feathers gracing the head of the infernal creature, “I’d be careful with that, they’ve been known to get nasty on occasion.”

 

 

 

“Fuck you and your fucking pets,” Sweeney growled, slipping the cigarette between his lips, his fingers tripping over the match that he was vainly trying to strike. For some reason his digits seemed clumsy, unpracticed, as if they belonged tracing your velvet skin and heaving breasts instead of fumbling on chips of pithy flint and tobacco leaves, or in some cases something a little stronger.

 

 

Instead of spewing a haughty, unwelcome lecture on the benefits of animal companionship or even grating out a low chuckle, like Sweeney would have expected, the old god was silent, prompting him to glance at the weather beaten face beside him in sudden concern for the integrity of his balls, not deigning to put Wednesday above delivering Sweeney a stout kick in the jewels for a bit too much lip.

 

 

  
But the god seemed intent on other things. He had paused, his head cocked as if he could hear something besides drunken shouts of revelry and the best hits of the 80s pouring from behind the chipped wooden doors of the dive bar. He was convinced that GrÍmnÍr had finally gone insane, a notion not unfamiliar to Sweeney, until he heard it too.

 

 

 

It was, Bran help him, _a voice on the fucking wind_. It whispered his name, called to the green in his blood, to the springtime rushing through his veins. It felt like the moors that he’d fitfully wandered as a lost King, the infernal rock that he’d guarded for an age, the moss that he’d lain his head on to sleep by night. It felt like fertile grassy dunes that rolled as far as the eye could see and sun swept, wind kissed cliff sides so bonny they’d trick you right into tumbling over their craggy edges.

 

 

 

_It felt like home._

 

 

Which could only mean one thing - someone was praying to him; a fresh bowl of cream from the feel of it, and even though it was undoubtedly store bought the sensation was something akin to ecstasy as it slid down his spine, curled low in his belly. He hated how long it had taken him to identify that feeling, like trying to call up fire from a pile of smoldering ash or summon the warm winds of summer from the frigid heart of a blizzard, though he would soon make up for it with a thorough investigation of the worshipper.

 

 

 

“It sounds like you have a prayer to answer,” Wednesday drawled at his side, his tone drenched with exaggerated impression and just a hint of poorly disguised jealousy, “Lucky duck.”

 

 

 

Needing reassurance, Sweeney hastily dipped into his concealed gold reserves and felt for his coin, the one that he couldn’t seem to hold on to, the one that felt like sunlight as he brushed his fingers against it. Sated that his prize was safe, he finally lit his cigarette and turned to leave, glad to have this disturbing conversation, and the orders that he had received within it, behind him.

 

 

 

"And where are you off to?" Wednesday called after him, his normally assured tone colored with just a hint of anxious concern that his casually doled out death sentence would be seen through. Sweeney delighted in that vulnerability, savored how it sparked against his skin for just a moment before he looked over one broad shoulder at the capricious god, flashing him a sharp grin.

 

"Maybe I've got my own fucking bird."

 

* * *

 

 

 

 _Goddamnit, someone fucking broke in again_.

 

 

You thought groggily as you slipped carefully out of bed, woken by the loud crash of one of your dining room chairs toppling over and an ensuing harshly grated curse, stifling an annoyed groan as you glanced at the absurdly late time illuminated by the clock on your night stand, adrenaline and anger sharpening your gaze, forcing the sleep from your eyes, heating your body, tensing your muscles for a fight. You closed sweating fingers around the handle of the aluminum bat that sat ready by your dresser as you passed the doorway, and in that instant you were grateful for your foresight to place the weapon in such an accessible location. You knew that it would be utterly useless against a gun, but its heavy weight resting in your palm was immensely reassuring nonetheless.

 

  
Silently, stealthily, you crept down the darkened hallway towards the intruder clomping around in your kitchen, your bare feet brushing soundlessly against the fake hardwood floor. When all this was over and you finally had enough dough saved up, you _really_ had to move to a better neighborhood. That, or upgrade your weapon of choice to a Glock.

 

 

Your heart raced in your chest as you caught sight of a wide set of sloping shoulders and broad back so huge they had to belong to a male, one who was currently stooping to raid your fridge, and you tightened your grip on the bat clutched in your shaking fingers in preparation to strike. Your pulse pounded in your ears as you watched the man select a beer, twisting off the top with a satisfied grunt and beginning to turn, his gaze happily fixed on the frosty brew resting in his large hand, so distracted by his bounty that he didn’t see you standing in the doorway, weapon brandished, until he was seated at your rickety kitchen table. To your increasing anger and confusion, thieves didn’t usually stop to grab a snack, the trespasser promptly braced his worn muddy boots on your fucking kitchen table and took a hearty drag.

 

 

Dimly, through the roar in your mind, you registered a faint shock of red in the beard of the intruder as you neared, noticed the familiar crook of his nose, which looked as if it had been broken once or twice, the fresh wounds that looked alarmingly recent marring his ruddy skin, crimson lines etched into golden flesh, the sharp cut of his cheekbones illuminated by the soft light of the open fridge. Your heart sputtered pitifully in your chest as realization sparked, and recognition fired hotly in your mind.

 

 

“Sweeney?” you sputtered, your voice a hissed whisper as you flicked on a light switch with the fingers of one hand, flooding the small kitchen with dim luminescence, still brandishing your weapon in the other, “What the fuck?”

 

 

He raised one copper eyebrow at the sight of you, bat raised to swipe at him, your scanty pjs wrinkled and your hair sleep ruffled, but at the moment you really couldn’t do anything other than gape, astounded at the fact that he was here, _that your prayer had actually fucking worked._

 

 

“What do you intend to do what that, lassling?” he questioned, swiping the shabby wool cap off of his russet head to toss it onto your table, pulling long and slow from the beer sweating in his huge hand after he questioned, “Tickle me with it?”

 

 

Following a brief throbbing moment in which you watched the strong lines of his throat work in tantalizing ways you weren’t nearly strong enough to glance away from, you shook yourself hard, stalwartly forcing your mind to anger instead of arousal. “This is a bad neighborhood,” you muttered, suddenly remembering the bat you had clutched in your grasp with a start and momentarily considering bludgeoning him with it anyway before finally deciding to rest it against the far wall, “Shit happens.”

 

 

 

“Next time just set out a bowl of this,” Sweeney husked, gazing lovingly at the Guinness he clutched in his grasp before those dark eyes swung to you, his gaze tripping up the long lines of bare leg exposed by your tiny pajama shorts in an leer that should be fucking _illegal_ , “Maybe lose the nightwear too, for good measure, and I’ll come runnin’ right as rain, darling.”

 

 

You sighed, combing a heavy hand through your hair as you leaned a hip against the kitchen table and crossed your arms over your chest, shock and incredulity warring for purchase in your tired mind as you processed not only the fact that the male sitting before you was one of the Tuatha Dé Danaan, a pantheon that you were now well versed in thanks to your new library card, but that he was lounging in a chair at _your_ table, drinking one of _your_ beers, and staring at the low cut of your tank top, obviously vying for a peek at your breasts.

 

 

That last fact didn’t make you angry as much as it made you incredibly fucking horny. You were sorry to admit that after Sweeney, other men just wouldn’t cut it. You’d given another dude a half-hearted lust fueled try a few nights back, but all that the encounter had done was leave you sweaty and frustrated, with no more relief than before the awkward tangle had begun.

 

 

So now, as you registered the fact that not only was he consuming your drinks, occupying your chairs and blatantly checking you out but that he’d also stripped off both his worn jean jacket and navy blue button down, you actually had to work not to salivate as your gaze flicked to the rippling muscles of his arms, the stout barrel of his nearly bare chest, the strong cut of his bearded jaw. _Fuck_ , somehow he was even more delicious than the last time you’d seen him. It didn’t help that your body had begun throbbing with half-remembered lust at the purely masculine musk emanating from him, the scent a heady mixture of sap and sweat and something cloyingly sweet, like fresh honey.

 

 

Finally your gaze landed on those broad shoulders that you knew from experience were quite grippable, neutral territory you supposed, and you cleared your throat in an attempt to direct your wayward thoughts to the pressing matter of your current luck.

 

 

“I’ll remember that,” you couldn’t quite stem the grin that bloomed on your lips as you fell marginally under the sway of his rugged charm, “But for now we have more important things to discuss.”

 

 

You were incredibly proud that your voice barely quavered, the anger lilting in your tone successfully masking any arousal that might threaten to break through there. For some reason you didn’t want him to know how badly you ached for him, how much you longed for his rough heated touches. Perhaps you could sense that if you revealed that damning fact he wouldn’t hesitate to take you right here on the table, before you’d gotten what you’d called him here for.

 

 

“Yes, we do,” Sweeney replied, the thumb he had begun sweeping over the peeling label drawing your gaze, sparking memories of that very same digit tugging at your bottom lip, sweeping circles around your clit, _fuc_ k you really had to focus here, “Like the fact that you know what I am.”

 

 

 

“I do,” you answered, settling into a chair opposite him and swiping the beer that he’d plunked onto the table, taking an emboldening swig from it as you spoke, “You’re a leprechaun.”

 

 

 

“More than just that, lassling,”Sweeney replied, appreciation at your boldness glinting in his gaze, tugging his lips into a grin as he leaned in, bracing those beefy forearms on the table, “I was a King once. A god even.”

 

 

 

At the incredulous eyebrow you quirked in his direction he cursed darkly and muttered something that sounded like  _General fucking Mills_ under his breath, swiping a hand over his beard before leaning in further to catch your gaze.

 

 

“These books you have, they’re good, maybe even some of the better ones, but every single one of them falls short. They tell you about us, sure, about how to draw us in, how to gain our favor, but they don’t tell you everything.” Sweeney’s eyes were wild as he gestured to your coffee table heavily laden with lore books, the green in his gaze beginning to shift, to churn like some storm ridden mossy sea, “They don’t tell you that Brigit was brave in the face of a loveless marriage, that she was as smart as a whip and could think up the best drinking songs. They don’t tell you that the Morrigan was heartless and fierce – she’d kick you in the balls one day and kiss you the next. And Bran,” Sweeney paused, a smile seeming to curve his lips in remembered joy so stark that it had an answering grin quirking your own mouth, “Bran, our greatest King, he was so fucking funny. He’d make you shit yourself with laughter. He could inspire even the weariest of troops to die for him with a smile.”

 

 

You found yourself hanging onto his every word, clamoring for more, curiosity flaring deep in your chest at the strange world in which this brutish, charming male had been born and bred. You could see real passion sparking behind his eyes as he spoke, real wrath and fervor, and it had something fiery and ancient roaring to life within you in fervent answer.

 

 

“No, they don’t say that,” you muttered, sliding the beer his way as you spoke, brushing your fingers against his in a touch that was equal parts comforting and curious, “But I’m glad that you told me. I’m glad that you remember them.”

 

 

“Less and less every day,” Sweeney replied, catching your fingers in his, brushing them against his palm, his touch reverent, gentle almost, “The more time that passes, the more I doubt they made the journey here to America,” his voice was abysmally somber, brimming with the poignant echoes of anger and isolation as he continued, “I think I’m the only one left.”

 

 

You didn’t want your heart to break for him, to positively fucking melt as he spoke those wrenching words, but that’s exactly what it fucking did. All your anger dissolved in a flash of empathy fueled understanding and warm thrumming confession. You were positive you would have kissed him then and there if he hadn’t spoken once more.

 

 

“Why have you called me here, _mo Éinín_ ,” Sweeney asked, untangling his fingers from yours as he snatched up the beer and took a heavy pull, successfully shattering the delicate moment that had passed between you. You shook your head hard, struggling to remember the purpose for your prayer, sifting through lust and tenderness tinged thoughts as arduously as though you were stepping through gossamer cobwebs.

 

 

“I wanted my luck back,” you supplied after a long pause, your gaze appraising as it fell on him, gauging his willingness to comply with your rigid demands, “I wanted answers that our last meeting didn’t provide me.”

 

 

“Oh, but our last meeting did provide you with _something_ , didn’t it?” Sweeney asked with a wink, his customary swagger firmly back in place, the action sending a shock of lust through you for all of its heavy handed charm. You could feel his eyes on you as you flushed, heat blooming on your skin, skating up your cheekbones, and you bit your lip as he clucked his tongue, tipping the neck of the beer bottle towards you in condemnation.

 

 

“Oh hell, you tried to fuck another male, didn’t ya?” Sweeney asked with about as much tact as a raging bull in a china shop, his blunt words making you gasp and gape at him, your jaw hanging slack as you wondered how the fuck he knew that, “It’s written all over your delicious body, lassling.” Your ensuing silence seemed answer enough for him, and you ground your teeth hard at the shit eating grin that spanned his sinful lips in response.

 

 

“How far did ya get?” he asked, smiling cheekily as he leaned in, a low chuckle already blooming on his lips. You sighed, rolling your eyes and glancing upwards as if in supplication to some god that you knew wasn’t listening, before you replied.

 

 

“A better question would be how long did it last.”

 

 

Sweeney howled in laughter, pitching his chair back and actually slapping his spread fucking knees as he whooped and hollered, his amusement so palpable that despite your stalwart frown you found a reluctant grin curving your lips, his obvious merriment positively contagious.

 

 

“Yeah, you’ve ruined everything else, why not my sex life too,” the dull seriousness of your words was starkly contrasted by the laughter beginning to bubble from your chest, further spurred by the full smile tugging at your mouth, “Congratulations, Sweeney.” You shared a moment of weary laughter before he drained the beer and tossed it into the bin by the fridge, his aim true and his arm steady.

 

 

“I swear by fucking Bran that wasn’t my intention, lassling,” Sweeney husked, that heart stopping smile still lingering about his tempting lips, and judging by the honesty thrumming in his gaze, you were inclined to believe him, “Though I know the coin can have adverse effects if it’s lost.”

 

 

 

“Oh no fucking shit,” you snapped, though there was no real anger behind your words, no heat to give them any bite, “All that money I made in tips I had to put towards a new radiator and a new restraining order against my creepy neighbor. Between that and the money I’d already spent, I was left with about a hundred bucks.”

 

 

 

“So you came out even then, all things considered?”

 

 

“Yeah, I guess,” you sighed, your brow furrowing as you realized that, saying it out loud, you weren’t really in bad shape.

 

 

“Then consider yourself lucky,” Sweeney said, danger glinting darkly in his gaze, warning brewing behind his smile, “Most that encounter this coin aren’t so fortunate. The price for losing it is usually bloody and painful.”

 

 

“Shit,” you muttered, inhaling deeply, catching the way that his gaze dipped and lingered on the low cut neckline of your tank top, fixing on the way your slow intake of air had your breasts prominently displayed for him, “Then I guess I am lucky after all. Sorry you wasted a trip.”

 

 

But Sweeney didn’t look sorry, in fact he looked strung out and desperate and fucking _hungry_ as he gazed at you, those green eyes flitting over your lips, fixating on your neck, the deep valley of your breasts, the place where your thighs touched as you crossed your legs. His gaze had your body flooding with heat, with molten lust, and you felt the air still as he spoke.

 

 

"You prayed to me, _mo Éinín_ ," he husked, eyes dark and hungry as he rose to his towering height, the abrupt action startling you, making you crane your neck upwards to follow his movements, "And you have no _fucking_ idea how good it felt." You didn’t speak as he took a step towards you, and you rose to meet him, bracing a hip against your table with a casualness that you didn’t feel mirrored in your chest, unfettered arousal wreaking havoc on your senses, “It was a feeling I've not felt in a fucking age, and I want _more_.”

 

“You see, _mo Éinín_ ,” Sweeney drawled, moving to rest a thickly muscled thigh against the table, knee tucked underneath, leaning in with one arm propped against the grainy surface, his stance effectively caging you in, leaving you nowhere to be except pressed against his hulking form, “Prayers mean belief, and belief is power. When you set out that sweet cream and begged for me, you might as well have set a line of morphine straight into my veins."

 

 

He began ghosting his hot mouth along your neck as he spoke, his wiry beard scratching gently over your sensitive flesh, and you shivered wildly when his tongue traced the spot where your pulse pounded the strongest, your fingers curling tighter around the edge of the table for stability, seeking the control you were so quickly losing.

 

 

“What do you want,” you questioned, tipping your head back to give him access to more of your heated skin, loving his wicked smile you could feel curving against your neck.

 

 

“Mindfulness,” his lips were scorching as they traced along your jaw, his tongue a lick of fire as it flicked against your ear, “Prayer,” his huge hands were pressing so hard into the table behind you, you were sure he’d leave indentations in the worn wood, and you almost cried out when you felt the pads of his fingers whirl unexpectedly against the soft exposed skin of your thighs, “Sacrifice,” you gasped when his teeth skimmed along the slim cord of your neck, stringing wicked shivers along their wake.

 

 

“Sacrifice,” you repeated without any real concern for the frightening implications of the word, too caught up on the balmy warmth of his huge chest that was curling around you, in the feel of his warm skin beneath your fingers that were tripping up the muscles in his shoulders, delighting in the strength they found there.

 

 

“Aye,” Sweeney crooned at your ear, his ministrations teasing the limits of your self-control, not quite enough to taunt you into action, but enough to keep you on edge, waiting, “I need your prayers, _mo Éinín,_ I need them like I need air. I tasted them, and they tasted like home, like sweet fucking earth and fresh cream, and I need more. I need sacrifice,” you couldn’t think of a single reason to object as you skimmed your palms up his sleeveless shirt clad chest, your fingers playing in the wiry hair they found there, tracing the numerous scars strewn across his flesh, “There are two ways that I can get it. Through violence,” his fingers were going to grind your table into a pulp, you were sure of it, “Or sex,” he punctuated his words with the sudden upwards rock of his muscled hips, his fevered thrust pressing the steel rod of his erection into the cradle of your thighs, wringing a low moan from your parted lips, “And with you I favor one over the other, when given the fair choice.”

 

 

“I know which one I want,” you said, your voice a wild tangle of lust and determined intent as you traced his collar bones, dipped your fingers into the hollow of his throat, “Will it work?” His responding laugh was as lilting as the springtime breeze, as sweet as wild berries.

 

 

“I felt your wee palms on my ass for days after our romp, and you didn't even believe in me then,” you felt his smile flash like sunshine against your skin, and you let the grin tugging at your lips bloom of its own accord as he continued, “It'll work.”

 

 

His hands traced the dips of your waist and the swell of your hips with obvious reverence, with thrumming admiration, his eyes glimmering with almost nervous anticipation as he asked, “Do you believe in me now?”

 

 

Your breath was firmly caught in your throat due to his hot lips skating over your skin, nipping at your flesh, but the vulnerable rasp of his tone, the desperate want seated there had you answering, “Yes.”

 

 

He captured your lips with surprising fervor then, grunting when you moaned against his mouth and laced your fingers into his thick hair, pulling him against you with needy fingers, slotting your hips against his, loving the lilting strength thrumming through his body, flooding his arms that wrapped around your waist, his thick fingers finding the soft skin beneath your tank top with ease. His hands spanned the smooth swell of your hips, and as you kissed he reached one scopic hand down to cup your thigh, curling his fingers securely around the limb to haul you up into his arms as if you were as light as a feather. His pure undiluted brawn made your head spin, had warm arousal flooding your belly, making your sex throb and your breasts ache for his touch.  

 

 

“The table,” you gasped in questioning suggestion as you tugged at the hem of his shirt, wanting to feel the hot skin roiling beneath it, wanting to trace it with your tongue.

 

 

“We’ll fucking break it,” he growled, making delighted gasps erupt from your lips that were captured so fully by his, your thoroughly distracted mind barely noticing the ease with which he walked you both to the couch just a few paces away, dimly registering the slide of the cushions beneath you as he settled you firmly onto the wide sofa. You only broke away from your heated kiss to rip your respective clothes off, your eager fingers making quick work of the sleeveless shirt that stood between you and the rippling muscles of his chest, his seeking hands sweeping the tank top over your head to reveal your naked breasts to his rapt gaze.

 

 

“Ah fuck, I didn’t get to see ya properly before, lassling,” Sweeney crooned, looking for all the world as though he might swoon at the sight of you exposed before him, “You’re fucking beautiful, darling.”

 

 

“Sweeney,” you groaned, twisting your hips in heated demand beneath him, reveling in the blush staining your cheeks at his words, rubbing a seeking thigh against that hardness throbbing between his legs to bring his hands back to you.

 

 

“Oh we’ll get there lass,” Sweeney groaned, dipping his wild russet head to fan his hot breath over your sensitive skin, “We’ll get there.”

 

 

You moaned as he closed his molten mouth over the tight bud of your nipple, his wicked tongue flicking over the throbbing peak, sending shivers racing over your skin. He kissed lazily over to your other breast, his long fingers kneading the pliant flesh that his mouth had just abandoned. You mewled when his mouth dipped lower, tracing the dips of your ribs, moving down over your taut stomach, his destination unmistakable. As if sensing you were about to question him, he paused and glanced up at you when he reached the waistband of your slim shorts, one huge hand curled around your thigh, spreading you open for him, the other slipping the scrap of cloth, panties and all, down your legs.

 

 

“Worship goes both ways, lass,” he husked, a playful glint sparking in those aphotic eyes, the hunger in his expression making something hot and urgent bloom low in your belly. Suddenly, as he knelt contritely between your thighs, he reminded you of some virile fertility god with his thick red hair and packed muscle, grinning at you with a smile that promised more and a wicked touch that delivered everything.

 

 

But before you could even think up a response his mouth was fixed on your spread sex, his tongue flicking up between your folds, his breath searing against your sensitive flesh. Your back arched when he lapped at your clit, swirling his tongue expertly around the tight bud of nerves, his fingers playing at your sex, seeking entry from your wet folds. You groaned his name as he slipped those thick fingers inside you, the slide of his digits sweetened by the rush of your arousal, the throb of your needy sex.

 

 

The fingers he slowly worked into your sex were thick, thicker than you’d ever had, but still you wanted more. You wanted the huge throbbing length of his shaft working in your pussy, you wanted his mouth at your neck, whispering naughty things in that accented voice at your ear, you wanted his hands on your skin, heavy and demanding.

 

 

“Sweeney, please,” you moaned, the lust swirling thickly in your mind stealing any further supplications from your lips, and yet somehow he knew, somehow he always fucking knew, as he raised his mouth from your sex and grinned, his lips slick from your arousal and his smile wide.

 

 

“Better than fresh cream,” Sweeney groaned, licking his lips with wanton hunger as he spoke, the lustful action making heat spark anew deep in your belly, causing your toes to curl where they were tucked against his calves.

 

 

“What do you want, lassling?” Sweeney questioned as he crawled up your body, pressing a stray kiss here against the jut of your hip bone, there in the valley of your breasts as he made his way up your form, his deft hands busy slipping his trews down his thickly muscled thighs, discarding them on the floor once they were off.

 

 

“Your cock, please,” you moaned, tipping your head back, revealing the sensitive flesh of your neck to his hot mouth, your body pliant beneath him as he sat up on his knees, bending your legs and grasping the backs of your thighs, spreading you open for him.

 

 

 

“Who do you pray to?” Sweeney questioned, running a hand down between your heaving breasts and over your stomach to slip a thumb through the wetness clinging to your thighs, pooling in your cunt, the digit circling lazily over your clit, a poignant reminder that he determined your pleasure, that he alone could wring these sensations from your body, “Whose sacrifice are you?”

 

 

“Yours! I pray to you, my body is yours,” you crooned, bowing into his touch, wanting his shaft, thick and perfect, wedged deep within you. As the words slipped from your lips you knew they were right, that this was right, and when you gazed up at Sweeney, his huge form looming above you, something in his eyes seemed to spark, to dance with mirth, and you realized then that you were fueling him, your devotion, your want, was giving him power. It was a heady feeling, that symbioticism, that joining of god and follower, of deity and devoted, and you shivered wildly when he lined up the blunt head of his shaft with your pounding sex, feeling something primeval rise in your veins then, clinging to your skin, crackling like lightning in time to the wild hammering of your heart.

 

 

“And I alone get your prayers?” Sweeney asked, stilling the driving press of his hips, ceasing the blissful slip of his cock inside your throbbing pussy, the thick muscles of his torso rippling with the momentous effort. You whined low, trying to buck up into him, to slip along his shaft, but the hands he had on your body were like iron shackles that stilled your desperate actions, that reminded you of his control, of his utter mastery.

 

 

 

“Yes! Sweeney, please!” you groaned, your skin beginning to ache, to itch from the stalling of this copulation, this joining. It felt like ceremony, like ritual, but it was leagues deeper than the mindful placement of fresh cream by a window or fervent prayers whispered kneeling by the bed. This was old worship, older than the Christian god, older than the most powerful empire, from a time when the gods were close at hand and communion with them was simpler, more base in nature.

 

 

 

“Say my name, lassling,” Sweeney said, his voice taut and stretched, like it was taking everything in him not to ram his shaft deep within you, to the hilt, and pound your pussy until you were a dripping mess beneath him, “I need to hear you say it.” You weren’t sure how you knew it, you didn’t really stop to question it, but his true name snapped into your mind with a precise clarity that shocked you, and it was forming on your lips before you’d even drawn in a breath.

 

 

“I am yours, _Buile Shuibhne_ ,” you moaned, rolling your hips as best you could and arching your back to tempt him, pressing your breasts up in offering, “My prayers are yours, my body is yours. My cream and my crop, my faith and my fields. Claim me, _Shuibhne_ , make me yours.”

 

 

“Ah fuck, _mo Éinín,_ ” Sweeney groaned, situating his hand more firmly about your waist, his long fingers spanning the distance between your hips as he pressed his flanks forward, snapping his shaft deep into your pussy in a searing thrust that you felt rattle down to your bones. He set that familiar driving pace, the one your cunt had begun to crave, as he tightened the fingers he had curled around the back of your thigh, using that grip as leverage to bounce you hard and fast on him.

 

 

You gave in to the harsh demands of his body, of his stalwart hands and his hard, thick shaft, gifting your pleasure to him, and in response he pounded your cunt harder, gripped your thighs more firmly, praised you with huffed phrases comprised of _good fucking girl_ and _that’s my little bird._ It was all so goddamned good, the way that he felt slipping in and out of your tight heat, the salacious slap of his skin against yours, the deep bite of his fingers into your flesh. You were no stranger to good sex, no novice in the arts of pleasure, but this was different, this was elevated, more than mere corporeal joining. This was worship, and Sweeney had been right; it went both ways. You worshiped him, and he worshipped you right back.

 

 

Every time you closed your eyes you caught glimpses of scenes that were certainly not originating from your shitty little apartment, scenes like a dark moor at the heart of midnight, fog strewn and quiet, like an ancient stone jutting like a spear from the ground, moss decorating its proud surface, dawn’s light breaking high over it’s peak. You were certain that these visions were emanating from him, from his mind, from his psyche, so you didn’t question them, you just reveled in their pleasant bite as they roiled over your skin, danced on your tongue.

 

 

“You have no idea how this power feels burrowing beneath my skin,” he groaned as he fed that delicious shaft into your body, wrenching you back onto him with increasing force, his head tipped back in ecstasy, “I can fucking _feel_ you, all of you, your fealty, your pleasure, your sweet, sweet cunt. By fucking Bran, why the _fuck_ did I even bother with cream for so fucking long?”

 

 

You laughed breathlessly in response, your inhalations snatched away by the pounding drive of his hips, the harsh snap of his thighs, though you found the air to moan loudly when he slipped his fingers against your pussy, two thick digits immediately moving to circle your clit, mercilessly rubbing that taut bud of nerves in just the right way, the way that had you panting as you teetered on the edge of a blissful, efficacious orgasm.

 

 

“Oh f-fuck, I’m g-gonna cum,” you grated, your teeth clenching hard, sweat pooling on your heated skin as you valiantly fought the waves of pleasure that rose up within you like the ebbing of the tide before a tsunami, an almighty warning of the impending frenzy.

 

 

“Don’t hold back, lassling, cum for me. Cum with my shaft deep inside you and my name on your lips,” his pressing fingers quickened on your clit, catching the sensitive bud of nerves just right, igniting a fire that began in the arches of your feet and traveled ravenously up your limbs, flooding your spine, snapping in time to the drive of his hips, “Cum now.”

 

 

And so you did, your body helpless to do anything but obey him, his name falling like a broken, urgent prayer from your lips as you writhed beneath him, your head thrown back, your jaw slack and your thighs trembling as you clenched hard around him. You felt him thrust his stuttering hips into you, thick length moving through your fiery pulsing orgasm a handful of times before he was cursing wickedly and cumming right behind you, emptying jet after jet of hot release into your aching sex.

 

 

Sweeney collapsed onto you after he was spent, his sweat slicked skin brushing against yours, the heavy weight of his body not altogether uncomfortable, and as he lay in your arms you slipped your fingers lazily down the notches of his spine, dragging your nails up his muscled back. His breaths were huffing hard and fast against your neck, his beard scratching the juncture of your shoulder where his face lay tucked against you, and you smiled as you heard him mutter something about you being the best lay he’d ever had in all his long fucking life.

 

 

“We’re _so_ doing that again soon,” you murmured sleepily, the lateness of the hour and the wrenching orgasm he’d just drawn from your body pressing heavily on you, heavier than the monolith currently balanced atop you. Your jaw cracked open in a scathing yawn just as Sweeney shifted, palming your ass as he moved your bodies so that you lay side by side on the couch, limbs coiled in a sweaty tangle, your head pressed close against his chest as you both crooned out tired laughs.

 

 

“Oh fuck yeah,” Sweeney gracelessly husked, the hand he had spanning your ass squeezing with appreciative gusto, his lips ghosting the shell of your ear, his roguish smile curving against your hair as he continued, “And as for your luck, _mo Éinín,_ don’t you worry, me and your coin won’t be going far from ye. Not now. Not ever.”

 

 

You knew that he wouldn’t be there in the morning; you knew that you’d wake up alone, with a sore cunt and a satisfied throb between your thighs, but right now, with his arms tight around you and his sweet promises ringing in your ear, you couldn’t really find the wherewithal to give a damn.

 

 

He was your god and you were his votary, and right now, in the soft light of early morning, that was all that mattered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello Lovely Readers!
> 
> OMG so this chapter is almost 8,000 words long! It's definitely longer than I intended, but I do really hope that you enjoy it, there are some big names and references in this chapter! I really hope that you made it through until the end and that you liked the chapter! How about that smut though?? Any thoughts on Sweeney here in this chapter?? I love your wonderful feedback, thank you so much!
> 
> In other news, I'm expanding this fic to about 5 chapters instead of 3! Woohoo! I'm thinking that each chapter will be centered around the coin and it's implications on their relationship, so if you're interested in that, read on!
> 
> Mood Board coming soon!
> 
> EDIT: Moodboard
> 
> http://imagines-oneshots-blog.tumblr.com/post/162613620444/all-that-glitters-chapter-3-sweet-cream-sordid


	4. Vol IV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hello Lovely Readers! Just a quick note before you begin; this chapter takes place in that missing chunk of time in Episode 1 between Shadow and Sweeney's fight and when we see Sweeney slumped over the toilet in the morning. Please enjoy!

Chapter Four: Fresh Blood, Honeyed Mead and a Drunkard’s Confession

 

You could have refused her, you probably should have, but you’d been too worried, too blatantly curious to ignore Jack’s fervent phone calls, even now on your night off. All that the steely eyed bar owner had said during your brief, static-mottled conversation was that there was a problem at the bar only you could deal with, and to hurry your pert ass up.

 

So here you were, small black skirt, the first presentable piece of clothing laying on your floor that your hasty fingers had closed around, slipping around your thighs, non-descript rock band t shirt that served as your pajamas clinging to your chest, your car keys rattling noisily in your hand with each bounding vans-clad step you took towards the Crocodile.

  
As you barged into the bustling establishment you searched fervently for Jack, scanning for her customary knowing eyes and curly fall of peppered hair, but she found you first, her slim fingers curling around your wrist in a grip that could only be described as vice-like.

 

“Boy am I glad to see you, Kitty,” she sighed to your left, something almost angry roiling in her dark gaze as it fixed on you, though you could tell in an instant that you weren’t the source of her ire, “We have a problem in the men’s room.”

 

Before your brow had even finished furrowing and your mouth could open far enough for you to question further Jack’s fingers tightened, slipping more firmly about your wrist bones as a grim determination set in the prudent lines of her stalwart features, “An oversized, ginger haired, fight startin’ problem.”

 

“ _Shit_ ,” you grated in sudden understanding, swiping an unexpectedly clammy hand through your unkempt hair and rolling your eyes, “Now I understand why you didn’t elaborate on the phone.”

 

Jack shot you a look in reply that was almost apologetic, but you weren’t actually angry despite the jagged bite roiling in your accusing words, “There aren’t many who would run straight into such a pickle. I wouldn’t even have bothered you, Sugar, not on your night off, but that overgrown jackass is asking for you by name, and has tried to beat the ever lovin’ shit out of anyone else who had the stones to confront him,” the glint sparking behind her bright eyes was all suspicion and intrigue, but she didn’t question further like you’d expected. Instead she glanced at you from the sides of her brimming eyes and turned her smirking mouth up into a wry grin that sent embarrassment sizzling hot and incriminating up your cheekbones.

 

With a nondescript noise of acknowledgement and a nervous motion that could be interpreted as a shrug, you gladly followed suit as Jack turned and led the way past hollering bar patrons and rambling drunks to the darker corners  that lurked near the back of the establishment. Jack gestured towards the dingy men’s room, a sympathetic glance, a first aid kit and a comforting pat on the shoulder serving as her parting gifts to you before she strode away, back to her bustling bar. You steeled yourself with a deep resigned inhale and the brief straightening of your spine before you strode into the men’s room, opening the faux crocodile skin door with the help of one brave shoulder.

 

When you caught sight of The Problem splayed out brashly on the linoleum floor, dripping crimson blood onto the cracked yellowing tile, you realized that you probably should have stayed at home.

 

Sweeney was crumpled on the floor just outside a worn wooden stall, one long leg propped up so that he could rest a brawny forearm on it, the other splayed out carelessly in front of him. Somewhere in the night he’d lost both his customary jacket and dark blue button up, though you didn’t have much to complain about as your hungry gaze took in the sight of his wide bruised shoulders and thick arms. He held a sad excuse for a bandage up to the apparent source of all the blood staining the dingy floor, a cut slashing red and angry just above one tawny brow, and cradled the inflamed curve of one cheekbone with his other hand, though judging by the acrid curses slipping from his lips the action was doing absolutely nothing to soothe his hard won pains.

 

“You tell that motherfuckin’ _c_ _úl t_ _óna_ behind the bar that I’m finished drinkin’ when I fuckin’ say so,” Sweeney growled, pressing one red stained finger into the firm flesh of his breastbone, kissing the golden skin roiling there with just a hint of crimson, “Not when his pansy arse ‘cuts me off,’” the air quotes he slashed in the air had to be the most sardonic and bitter hand motions that you’d ever witnessed, but his petulant anger and obviously inebriated state had amusement flitting in your chest nonetheless, merely because it was him, and he was such a _glorious_ asshole.

 

When his bleary eyes fell on you and his alcohol addled brain caught up to the sight before him, he flashed you what you figured was supposed to be a charming smile, but the blood caught in his teeth lent the expression a particularly macabre tinge.

 

“My little bird,” he crooned, still flashing that awful crimson stained smile up at you, struggling to lodge one huge foot securely beneath him, willing the poorly placed appendage to act as an anchor for his uncompliant, humongous form, and as you’d expected he was failing, “Where did you fly in from?”

 

“Jesus,” you grated under your breath as you moved forward and crouched to loop one slim arm around his back, huffing with exertion at the crushing press of his mostly dead weight slung across your shoulders, achieving a precarious balance between the inebriated giant leaning heavily against your side and the first aid kit tucked into the crook of your elbow. He stank of beer and southern comfort and something that smelled like rotten fruit, but you figured it was better that you didn’t know the details of his obviously cataclysmic night.

 

With gentle directions huffed under your breath and the prodding press of your fingers into his muscled shoulder, you finally got him settled on a stool that you and the other more height challenged Crocodile employees kept stashed between the sinks so that you could successfully clean the mirrors. That is, the one time a year you _did_ clean them.

 

“You think this is bad, you should see the other guy,” Sweeney announced proudly once he was settled onto his minuscule perch, and though most of his thick ass was hanging off the small slip of plastic, for now it would hold him, “Sent him runnin’ back to his man with his tail tucked firm between his legs.”

 

“Uh huh,” you mumbled, working hard not to let your momentous incredulity show on your features, using most of your concentration to examine his multiple bleeding wounds.

 

“I’m serious as a fuckin’ heart attack, _mo Éinín,_ _”_ Sweeney insisted, his eyes wide as they settled on your face, which was currently hovering close to his as you tried to discern whether or not he’d broken anything and if that nasty cut marring his cheekbone needed stitches, “What, you don’t think I could? You don’t think I could send a foe howlin’ away into the bleedin’ night?”

 

“I _think_ your nose is broken,” you sighed, shooting him an incriminating glare as you spoke, trying hard to ignore the dark smolder of his gaze and the lilting upturn of his smile that showed as he regarded you with something that danced dangerously close to affection playing gleefully behind his eyes, “Again, from the looks of it. How many times does this make?”

 

“Ah, I stopped countin’ after a hundred,” he replied, the number slipping off his tongue like it was nothing, like he’d always expected it to be so high.

 

You gaped at him for a long moment before you shook your head, remembering exactly who, or rather _what_ , you were talking to, though at the moment it was hard to imagine that this drunken mess of a creature singing a tone deaf rendition of Danny Boy under his breath and swaying along like it was a fucking masterpiece was anything but a complete dumbass. Sighing, you turned on the sink to collect a small pool of water in your cupped hands. You raised this to his lips, ordering him to rinse, hoping to remove some of the dried blood sticking to his teeth, muddying his otherwise charming smile. After he’d swilled the liquid long enough you had him spit, then you popped open the first aid kit to grab some gauze and alcohol wipes.

 

“There’s glass in your wounds,” you explained as you unwrapped one wipe from its package and brandished it in a determined hand, “I’m gonna have to dig the pieces out, and I’m not gonna lie, it’ll hurt.”

 

“I can take whatever you dole out lassling,” Sweeney replied, all bravado and pride as he fucking _puffed out his chest_ and slapped his hands on his knees, offering his slashed cheek to you, “I thought you’d know that by now.”

 

You diplomatically chose to ignore him and the innuendo coiling thick beneath his words as you moved in, swiping the small pad of peroxide with little regard for his comfort, hoping the pain would sober him up somewhat. Your efforts had no such effect, however, as even while you were gouging out his wounds in what had to be deep painful swipes he kept pawing at your ass, which was just within reach when you leaned into him.

 

“Jesus Christ, Sweeney, you’re like a horny teenage boy,” you chided as you slapped his wandering hand away for the fifth time, heartily trying to stem the wry grin that bloomed on your lips at his adamancy, helpless to admit that despite the annoyance running rampant in your tone you were just so damned _charmed_ by him.

 

“I can’t help it, lassling. The sight of you in that short little skirt has me randy like I’m still wet behind the ears,” Sweeney growled, heat banked heavy and molten in his tone as his seeking palm finally found it’s desired perch on the swell of your hips, his fingers wasting no time in groping appreciatively, “It reminds me of another time when you wore a similar skirt and we found ourselves together in a similar bathroom.”

 

Remembered heat throbbed low and hot in your belly at his words, though after a moment of basking in it’s balmy heat you batted it away fiercely, struggling to focus solely on the crimson marring his skin like a curse, the sharp smell of cheap beer wafting from him, but the way that the scent mixed with his natural sylvan musk was undeniably, strangely tantalizing, and the blood flecking his roiling muscles, dotting his freckled shoulders like the coppery light of Venus as it split the night sky only seemed to highlight his barbarism, his sheer unfettered strength. You sighed then, realizing that, no matter how you tried to deny it, you just might have a _thing_ for violent temperamental men that hid hearts of gold deep in their brawny chests.

 

“ _That_ bathroom was smaller,” you replied, masking your tone so that none of your desire or affection for him peeked through, “And you didn’t have a broken nose then.”

 

“What will it take for me to afford you again, my little bird,” Sweeney asked, leaning back to regard you, his hands, which had previously been propped up on the sinks wedged on either side of him, moving to his battered face, “Is it really the nose, because that I can fix.”

 

  
Without warning Sweeney cupped both scopic hands around the red , slightly swollen appendage and snapped it back into place with a smooth practiced motion and a sickeningly wet crunch that had nausea playing thickly at the back of your throat, incredulity making a choked disbelieving laugh bubble humorlessly about your lips. Dimly, through the ringing in your ears, you realized that someone else’s blood was caked beneath his fingernails.

 

“No, I think you need more than that, lassling,” Sweeney crooned, looking utterly unaffected that he’d just realigned his own broken nose without as much as a blink, “I think you need gifts that can woo a woman, gifts of gold. Gifts like this,” Sweeney husked as he brought his split knuckled fingers up to your cheek, sliding them with surprising gentleness along your jaw before tucking them into the hair at your neck, just behind your ear, and pulling out a single glimmering gold coin for your surprised gaze.

 

“You don’t have to earn anything, Sweeney,” you replied as you regarded him, his offering glinting in his huge palm, and you spoke again once you’d curled his fingers securely around the metal, encasing the gift in his grip, “Not with me. Just stop getting into bar fights and acting like an idiot.”

 

For a few long moments Sweeney regarded you, his expression not one of anguish, but rather impression, appreciation, and finally he scoffed and procured a beer from _thin fucking air_ to raise in placation to his lips.

 

“Well _fuck_ me,” Sweeney grated, uncapping the beer with the ring glittering on his pinkie and gazing up at you from his slumped position between the sinks, “If that’s what you want then I’ll never be deserving of ya.”

 

“Where the hell did you get that?” you questioned, fervent disbelief making your question sharp and incredulous as you gestured to the brew sweating in his palm, pressing against his lips, bracing one arm against your hip as you stared wide eyed at him.

 

“Plucked it out of thin air,” he murmured against the lip of the bottle, snapping a wry wink in your direction as he gulped heavily. The red glinting on the label of the beer was an almost perfect echo of the blood clotting his numerous wounds, crimson stark against pale flesh. You sighed, resigning yourself to never fully understanding this enigmatic perplexing male, letting him have his damn beer even though the absolute last thing he needed was more fucking alcohol.

 

You begrudgingly accepted that this was the most care and medical attention that your aggravating Leprechaun would allow tonight, so with a sigh you tossed the soiled swabs into the trash can and closed up the first aid kit, slipping it into your long discarded bag and looping the satchel over your shoulder. You had just begun to turn towards the door, to leave him with his beer and his sorrows, when a question flitted into your mind, a stark, glimmering unignorable question that scratched at your throat and rammed against your teeth, demanding purchase, demanding release into the urinal cake scented air.

 

“Why did you talk to me that day?” you blurted out, unable to hold back the inquiry, sure that it would claw its way out of your chest regardless of your valiantly intentioned, but admittedly shitty self-control, “All the employees here tell me that you’re surly and short with everyone in this bar, but that day when you sat down in my section and asked if I was on the menu you were flirting with me. Why? Why me?”

 

Your pulse pounded in your ears as you awaited your answer, watching raptly as Sweeney stopped sipping and faced you fully, the heat of his gaze making you realize that you were standing right between his spread legs, your heaving chest nearly pressed up against him, your knees almost high enough to hook around his sturdy thighs. He smirked as if he could sense this licentious realization dawning within you, the grin that spanned his lips slow and lazy, as if he’d been waiting for you to catch up.

 

“Perhaps, it was because you were new and your t-shirt’s neckline was low,” he began wryly, gesturing towards you with the tip of his bottle, slipping the lip of it down your chest, tracing the 80s style rose embossed on your top, “Or perhaps it was because, even then, I could tell you were one to believe in fairy tales and forgotten saints. Perhaps even then I could sense in you a spark of the old world, of those ancient days when the old gods walked, and the bite of it was sweet as sin and its taste was like ripe berries on my tongue,” the green of his gaze was shimmering again, glinting with that heated coil that you knew so well, and you swallowed thickly as he finished, “Perhaps I wanted _more_.”

 

“You certainly got it,” you whispered, spellbound by the prurient heat roiling in his gaze, curving his lips, flicking his tongue out to swipe at the seam of his mouth. You were certain that you would have fallen straight into his arms right then if you hadn’t caught sight of a small slip of blood marring his cheekbone, a wound that you’d missed, the crimson liquid matting his beard, stark like fire against the ruddy lines of his face. You used that as an anchor to lay in the tempestuous harbor of your good judgement, a feature that was pitifully small within you, but as you breathed in deep, the scent of watered down beer and sweat overpowering the musky pine and sweet sap that was all Sweeney, you knew that tonight you could walk away from him, that tonight you _should_.

 

As you turned to go, managing the full rotation this time, you sensed him begin to rise behind you and you raised a hand to stop him, glancing at him over your shoulder as you paused by the door, “Oh no, you’re not coming home with me. You need to dry out, wipe your damn face, and take a shower. _Maybe_ then we’ll see,” you finished with a small smile, feeling something like _power_ kissing your skin, slipping up your spine to bloom in your chest, and with that heady sensation emboldening you, you flicked him a playful wink, letting your hips sway as you strode out the door.

 

Despite the empowerment twining through your veins, straightening your shoulders, sharpening your smile as you met Jack’s curious gaze, you still shivered as you heard Sweeney’s voice crooning behind you, soft and sweet as temptation, heated as some ancient venerable plea as it slipped against your hips, caressed the silk of your thighs.

 

_“Then I’ll definitely be wantin’ more, lassling.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello Lovely Readers!
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this chapter! No smut this time, but we do have a little more relationship development, woohoo! This chapter is a little shorter, so I should be able to post Chapter 5 soon, and it will be epic! Stay tuned for that! What did we think of drunk handsy Sweeney?? Anyone else love it?! Please let me know your thoughts on this chapter, and THANK YOU for your amazing support! You all are AWESOME! <3
> 
> Small note: _c_ _úl t_ _óna_ means 'dickhead' in Gaelic! Yay for bad words!
> 
> Mood Board for this chapter! 
> 
> http://imagines-oneshots-blog.tumblr.com/post/162926606224/all-that-glitters-chapter-4-fresh-blood-honeyed


	5. Vol V

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another quick note before you begin this chapter, for continuities sake; this takes place directly after Chapter 4!
> 
> That's all, roll the fic!

Chapter Five: Dried Blood, Day Old Sorrows and a Perfect Plan

 

 

_Knock. Knock. Knock._

 

 

Three booming crashes sounded from behind the door to your tiny apartment, stark like the crack of a whip and many times more biting as they drew you from your much needed sleep. Whoever the hell it was would just have to fuck off and, judging by the bright rays of early morning sunshine spilling from behind your curtains, come back at a much more respectable time. There was no force in heaven or earth or even hell itself that could drag you out of bed, not after the night you’d had.

 

_Knock. Knock. Knock._

 

 

Those pounding hits came again, rattling your shitty door in its cheap frame, and still you refused to get up. It was more than enough that in one twenty four hour period you’d been called into work in the middle of the night to play nurse maid to your ill-tempered, sorta fuck-buddy Leprechaun, you would  _not_  be disturbed again unless the world was fucking ending. So with a huff and an indignant sniff, you pulled the blankets tighter about your slumber draped form, rolled over and promptly fell back asleep.

 

 

That’s why you were still wiping fervent dreams from your bleary eyes as you stumbled out of your bedroom a few hours later, intruder blessedly absent from your doorstep, though the weary motion caused you to entirely miss the haggard lump sprawled out on your couch. You made a fresh mug of coffee, grabbed a bagel and were about to head back to your room when a splash of crimson that most definitely didn’t belong to one of your throw pillows caught your eye.

 

 

You supposed that you should have been surprised when you caught sight of the cranky Leprechaun dozing on your couch, half healed wounds petulantly threatening to drip fresh blood onto the crisp cushions, hell you figured that you should even be a little angry, and you absolutely were. But you definitely shouldn’t be a little bit charmed, a little bit amused, and your traitorous heart certainly shouldn’t be stuttering hard in your chest, flipping like it was  _pleased_ by the sight before it.

 

 

The badly beaten, but slightly cleaner Leprechaun passed out on your sofa, spread out on cushions that were far too small for his hulking form, was fully engulfed in the peaceful vice of slumber, brawny arms folded over a wide chest that rose and fell with each of his slow breaths, his raging brow calm and smooth, his ruddy skin marred only occasionally by the errant gash of bright copper, beads of fresh blood glimmering like garnets in the spun wire of his full beard. Russet lashes fanned over freckled, moon pale cheeks, slashed faint shadows down his high cheekbones, cloaking eyes that you knew were the exact color of fertile rolling hills and wild mossy cliffs. He looked peaceful in sleep, noble almost, like he really could have been a King once, like he belonged to a world long forgotten in the tumultuous mists of time.

 

 

And then he snorted, the sound so undignified and jarring that you were instantly sure he’d woken up the entire neighborhood a whole fucking block over, and rolled onto his front, the action putting his poorly maintained, dripping wounds directly in line with the pristine cushions of your rented furniture. How he’d even managed to attain a whole slew of fresh cuts on his already scuffed face in a matter of a few hours was far beyond you.

 

 

Cursing under your breath you shuffled over to him, standing between your coffee table and the couch, staring down at him with what had to be a strange mixture of amusement and annoyance coloring your features. You plunked the bagel down on the fake balsa wood behind you but kept the coffee in hand, glad for its steaming weight in your palm.

 

 

Gingerly you prodded the thick heft of his shoulder with two fingers, shifting the solid chunk of muscle in a repeated jarring motion. Nothing. Sweeney didn’t even as much as grunt in acknowledgement. You prodded his shoulder harder, with more gusto, letting yourself briefly entertain a slim thread of girlish appreciation for the elasticity and strength of the sinew coiled beneath your fingers. Still nothing.

 

 

“Sweeney,” you called softly, mindful that after his rambunctious night he was in for one hell of a hangover this morning, leaning in close to waft the coffee just under his protruding nose, your cup brimming with a full bodied hazelnut blend that you hoped would entice him to wakefulness so that he could river dance his unwelcome ass straight out of here.  _Still_ nothing.

 

 

“ _Sweeney_ ,” you barked, frustration blooming thick and gnarled in your chest, spurring you to slap the firm flesh of his ass hard with your free hand, your fingers brushing dangerously, intentionally, close to his more sensitive bits. That finally seemed to work, what with the integrity of his balls suddenly thrown into the balance, and he jolted awake with a coarsely grated curse and a furrowed brow.

 

 

“Good morning,” you cooed with exaggerated excitement as he sat up and glanced around, the surly expression gracing his face tugging his worn features into the exact arrangement you would expect from someone who’d spent the better part of their night slumped over a toilet, “Not at your finest this bright morn’, are ya boyo?”

 

 

Your mocking tone and poorly imitated accent earned you a scathing glance that held all the bitterness of an upset kitten, so in response you just chuckled and sipped your coffee, watching with blatant amusement as he fitfully attempted to heave his haggard body into some semblance of an upright position. Your snickers deepened when he hung his lank head between his knees like he was going to puke.  


 

“What the fuck are you doing on my couch,” you questioned, internally commending yourself on your level, no nonsense tone, despite the poignant mix of heat and annoyance that was warring for purchase in your chest, “I believe I told you that you could  _not_ come home with me.”

 

 

“Technically, I didn’t,” he replied, bracing a huge hand on his tender ribs, where you assumed he’d been delivered a few swift, well deserved, ire fueled kicks some twelve or so hours ago, “I came in this morning, after you wouldn’t answer my knocks.” So _that_  was who had been at your door, pounding away like a maniac. Of  _fucking_  course.

 

 

“ _Broke_  in,” you corrected, peering at him accusingly over the rim of your mug, glad for the caffeine whirling in your temples, helping you deal with this brand new fucked up situation that the day had delivered into your weary lap, “That’s what it’s called when you’re not invited but you come in anyway. And this is the second time you’ve made yourself at home here without my permission. Is that becoming our thing?”

 

 

“Ah fuck, I hope so,” Sweeney replied, finally finding a comfortable position that didn’t rattle his aching bones too much, using the respite that his precarious perch afforded him to sweep his molten gaze down your pajama clad form with poorly concealed want, his glinting eyes tracing the long bare lines of your legs, scrounging for a hint of your breasts beneath your thin t shirt, “I’m starting to like the sight of you in your bed clothes. Though I will say that the sight of you in nothing at all is much more preferable, out of all the options.”

 

 

“Mmm,” you made a nondescript noise in the back of your throat to stem the gentle moan that threatened to escape from your chest at his words, pretending to consider carefully before you replied, “It seems to me that options are a luxury you don’t have right now. Why else would you be sitting on my sofa, dripping blood onto my cushions?”

 

 

You followed your rhetorical question with an accusatory glance at the multiple wounds oozing thick crimson liquid onto his pink healing skin, threatening to stain your unspoiled furniture. At least he had the decency to look ashamed, though there was still something wicked crackling behind his eyes, flashing at the corners of his lips, that made his contrition feel naughty somehow.

 

 

“I always knew you were a smart one,” Sweeney quipped in reply, shooting you an appraising glance from beneath his heavy lids, resting his head against the back of the sofa as if he hoped the new angle would ease some of the pounding in his temples.

 

 

“Obviously I’m not, because I keep letting you come around,” you replied, resting a shin against the bottom of the couch, shifting your weight to one side so that you could rest that mug in the swell of your waist, “And I haven’t kicked you out yet.”

 

 

“Thank Jesus for life’s little mysteries,” Sweeney crooned, looking downright saintly as his sage and sunshine tinged eyes rolled upwards, in mock supplication to the heavens, to the pearly throne that he knew none of his kind currently occupied. You couldn’t stem the small laugh that burst from your lips then, giggling as you imagined him in full priestly garb, chiding yourself for the burst of warmth that pooled between your thighs as you pictured him, cleaner and less scuffed up, tall and brawny and temptingly untouchable. Your Catholic upbringing may have planted a few more seeds of authoritative respect within you than you’d like to admit.

 

 

“What is it with you and the Catholics,” you questioned around a smile that was much too wide to be borne out of pure fleeting amusement, “It’s not like they were only dicks to you and your kind.”

 

 

“And that’s supposed to be a comfort?” Sweeney asked, raising one copper brow incredulously in your direction, the barest hint of a smile playing about his lips despite the grim seriousness of his tone, “Those self-righteous nonce’s pranced about like they had every fucking right to be there, preaching love and acceptance without a price – oh except for the ancient traditions of your homeland and utter devotion of your gods,” you could see something dark and hateful brewing in Sweeney’s eyes, flashing like lightning in the churning deep green of his irises, “It wasn’t enough to seize our land and destroy our temples and turn us into measly sprites barely as big as your thumb, they took all our worshippers too. Every single goddamned one.”

 

 

“Well,” you said softly after a heartbeat of brimming silence in which his words sunk like a brand into your heated skin, laying bare the depth of your feelings for him, however reluctant and surly they were, “Not  _all_  of them.” You glanced almost nervously at him, reveling in the surprise coloring his features, raising his brow and slackening his jaw.

 

 

“Still,” he whispered, reverence and incredulity banked deep in his tone, flashing iridescent and fragile in his gaze as it fixed on you, prompting one of his hands to raise in your direction, though halfway to you he seemed to think better of it and dropped the appendage back to his lap, “Even after last night, after everything?”

 

 

“You’re an asshole,” you shrugged, your words not backed as much by accusation as they were by cold hard fact, “But you’ve never been unkind to me. For all the shit you stir up you’re kind of a good time. And the uh, _ritual_ ,” you breathed, blushing as you struggled to find the adequate words to describe that cataclysmic night not so long ago when you’d breathed in his power, tasted it sweet and sensuous on your tongue, and had been left wanting more, “Not unpleasant.”

 

 

“Aye,” Sweeney husked, his aphotic eyes gleaming, sparking with molten want, churning as they met yours, his fingers twitching where they sat in his lap, curling upwards as if they longed to be tracing your hot skin, your brimming curves, instead, “Not unpleasant, indeed.”

 

 

You cleared your throat hard after a moment of charged eye contact, wanting answers almost as much as you wanted to jump his oversized, aggravating bones, “So, why the hell are you here?”

 

 

It was a lame half-hearted attempt at delaying the inevitable, you naked and needy pressed up against him, reveling together in the sacred fire of sacrament, he knew it, you knew it, but for the moment you both allowed the distraction.

 

 

“I lost it,” Sweeney answered after a long tense moment, an uncharacteristically dejected slope curving his wide shoulders, a strange, almost self-deprecating anguish tugging at his lips, “I  _fucking_  lost it.”

 

 

“What did you lose?”

 

 

“My coin,” he answered, looking heartbroken and utterly fucking wrecked as his gaze met yours, a foreboding quirk to his mouth, a dangerous glint in his eyes.

 

 

“You mean _the_  coin,” you breathed, incredulous despite yourself, “The one that you gave me as a tip?”

 

 

“The very same,” Sweeney replied, his gaze intent on his lap, where his fingers were busy fiddling with the cuff of his jacket, which he had miraculously procured once more, along with his dark blue button down. You almost lamented the loss of his glorious muscles exposed for your hungry gaze before you shook yourself hard and returned your distracted mind to the problem at hand.

 

 

“Shit,” you huffed, knowing full well the implications of that woeful fact, realizing then just how deeply fucked he was. No wonder he’d gotten trashed.

 

 

“Shit,” Sweeney concurred, bringing one unsteady hand up to sweep the long hair atop the crown of his head in what seemed to be an attempt at straightening the strands. His efforts were undeniably futile, “And if the dark eyed piece of shit who got the coin off me gave it away himself, like I suspect, and also gave it away to the person I’m suspecting in particular then I’m gonna have one hell of a time getting it back. Think night of the living dead in live putrid action,” your brow furrowed as the impossible implication of his words sunk into your mind, that stalwartly logical part of you rearing up to fervently deny that he could actually mean what he was hinting at, though you’d long ago learned not to question this strange world he traversed with bold, sometimes stupid ease. Still, you were skeptical; that coin of his couldn’t really bring back the dead, could it?

 

 

“I actually can’t take it back by force,” Sweeney continued, his voice weary, and you were grateful for the distraction from your uncomfortable thoughts of rotting flesh and dead eyes, “The owner has to give it willingly.”

 

 

“That does make sense,” you sighed after a heartbeat of weakly procured understanding, hating the weathered resignation banked in his features, the hopelessness flashing there, “Why else would you, a stranger, corner me, also a stranger, in a dingy bathroom and hate-fuck it out of me instead of just plucking it from my bra, where you knew it was hidden to begin with.” The comment earned you a tired smile and sincere chuckle, and you decided to take it, reveling in the mirth dancing about his features once more.

 

 

“Not unpleasant, though?” Sweeney questioned, meeting your gaze with the wry upturn of one tawny brow, the confidence whirring in his gaze making your breaths shorten and your cheeks flush.

 

 

“Not unpleasant,” you confirmed, grinning unabashedly at him, worrying the plump flesh of your bottom lip in an intentionally heated gesture.

 

 

You smiled at each other, a hard won familiarity lilting in the air between you then, connected as you were by the delicate threads of luck, circumstance and sheer stubbornness. You knew that you should be angrier, that you should probably kick him out, but he just looked so damned  _tired_ , so fucking sad and worn, as though he wasn’t quite sure if he wanted to fight anymore. Those macabre emotions suited him like a shabby coat that he’d long outgrown, ill-fitting and  _wrong_ , and you told yourself that was why you found yourself setting that steaming mug aside, drawing yourself up onto both feet, and asking with fervent sincerity, “What do you need?”

 

 

He stared at you for a moment that felt like an eternity before a grin cracked the grim line of his mouth, breathing welcome warmth into his fiery features once more.

 

 

“You know, I can’t remember the last time someone asked me that and meant it,” Sweeney husked, his tone bleeding and broken, and you found your heart shattering for him all over again, splitting wide open in the golden light of his bared soul, “What I need,  _mo Éinín_ , is prayer,” he reached out a hand to you and this time it found its intended destination, his seeking fingers sweeping up the backs of your calves, swirling against your thighs, making your balance wobble pitifully as you fought your instinct to give in to his molten touch, “Worship,” he leaned closer to press his hot mouth to the exposed skin between the waist band of your shorts and the hem of your t shirt, his mouth scalding, scattering tingles in its wake as it slipped along your flesh, “Power,” his voice was all husk and heat  as his breath fanned against your skin, skittered along your spine to coil low and hot in your belly, “And maybe a ride to Wisconsin.”

 

 

“Sweeney,” you murmured in a halfhearted attempt to distract him as his deft fingers began slipping your shorts down your legs, long thumbs hooking eagerly into your panties, seeking digits splayed about your thighs. Your voice wasn't really a protest, you’d be blatantly lying if you said you didn’t want him; it was more like a gentle reminder that he was bleeding from several newly acquired cuts, harboring multiple bruises, and was in no shape to be fucking anybody.

 

"What, do you want me to buy you dinner first?" He crooned teasingly, a knowing tinge to his voice, his palms already spreading your thighs with blatant intention, the surety of his touch making a dull ache roar to life deep in your sex, "Come on lassling, I know we both want it. Besides, I’m gonna need more strength, more  _power_ to get back what's mine."

 

 

“What you lost in the first place,” you teased, a wry grin curving your lips as his fingers brushed the wetness pooling in your panties, slickening your throbbing cunt, "Again."

 

 

Your taunts were rewarded with the heavy slap of his scopic palm against the firm flesh of your ass, the rough, heated action making a surprised gasp slip from your lips even as you leaned further into the domineering touch.

 

 

“I think you need a reminder of just how I got what’s rightfully mine back from ya,” Sweeney murmured as his hands slipped your t shirt up the curve of your waist, bunching the thin material just under your breasts so that he could lean in and kiss the soft skin there, swipe his teeth over your hip bones, “Of how I wrung it right out of your sweet curvy body.”

 

 

 

“With your injuries you're not going to remind anyone of anything,” you gasped, letting your head fall back, leaning into his touch even as you teased him, heartily reluctant to outright admit that you really did want to pray to him again, to worship him, if only for the electric sensations and smoldering orgasms that the sordid ritual wrung from your hungry body.

 

 

  
“Oh we’ll see about that,” Sweeney husked, beginning to twist his body in what was supposed to be a single fluid motion to pull you beneath him, but the screaming in his ribs stopped him, had him cursing low, gritting his teeth as he stilled and braced one hand against his middle.

 

 

“Uh huh,” you chided, a teasing grin curving your lips as you slid one knee to the outside of his brawny leg, hooking your limbs around him as you climbed onto his lap, loving the way one of his hands flew to your thigh to guide you firmly onto him, as if in silent approval of your wanton actions, “Like I said, you’re not reminding anyone of anything.”

 

 

Your deft hands peeled that threadbare jacket urgently from his shoulders, stripping it off his body in quick hungry motions, sending the scrap of denim tumbling haphazardly to the floor. His hands found the ripe curves of your hips as you pressed a long languorous kiss to his neck, sliding your tongue along the tight cords of muscle roiling beneath his warm skin. He began to use his firm grip on your thighs to slide you along his rapidly hardening shaft, his body responding fiercely to you despite its despondent state, but you stopped him with the nipping of your teeth against the juncture of his shoulder and the slip of your hands along his forearms.

 

  
“So here’s my counter offer. You said you needed prayer,” you husked at his ear, your fingers snapping open the buttons of his dark shirt one by one, punctuating each brimming syllable, “Worship,” you breathed, flicking your tongue against the sensitive shell of his ear as you graced his twitching shaft with one long slide of your panty clad sex against his steely hardness, “ _Power_ ,” he groaned at the feel of your wet pussy, hot and throbbing where he needed it the most, and you smiled against his skin as a wicked robust thrill ran down your spine, “So how about I take what I want,” you bucked your hips into his sharply, poignantly alerting him to your desires, lusts that he seemed all too eager to sate, “And you take what you need. Call it recompense for breaking in again.”

 

 

“Oh fuckin’ hell, lassling, you don’t know how badly I need ye,” Sweeney hummed his approval against the crook of your neck, where his mouth was busy nipping the warm skin there, his fingers already sliding up your back, bringing your t shirt with them, pulling it over your head to be forgotten on the floor, “How badly I’ve missed your sweet little body.”

 

 

Immediately his hands were on your breasts, kneading and cupping like he actually had missed the firm flesh there, though judging by the heartily pleased noises escaping from the back of his throat, apparently he _really_ had. When he kissed his way down your collarbones, his hot tongue dipping in the hollows of your throat, you leaned back to give him access, wanting more of his lilting expert touch, bracing your hands behind you, on his spread knees, for support.

 

 

He took your offering with wildly appreciative fervor, his seeking mouth sliding eagerly down between the valley of your breasts, the wire of his beard scratching your flushed skin, teasing the warm flesh there. When his hot mouth closed around the bud of your nipple and you felt his teeth graze the sensitive peak you cried out his name, the syllables falling like a prayer from your lips, and your sex throbbed as you heard his low growl, felt it ripple against your flesh.

 

  
You knew then that you were fueling him once more, and you writhed in his lap as you felt that fiery connection tripping beneath your skin like a live wire, reveling in its bite as it clung to your bones, sizzled through your veins. As his hands slid around your back, caging you in, clutching you to him, you wondered if this was what worshipping was always meant to be, if the old gods had really been onto something here, what with the vivid, visceral sensations swirling about you. You were becoming lost in his adoration, swept up by the fervor of his devotion, and at the moment there was nowhere else you’d rather be.

 

 

 

He knew just where to sweep those long fingers, where to press that deft tongue, how to grind that thick shaft into you so that  you were wild for him, rolling your hips in wanton lust, gripping the cut muscles of his shoulders hard. Every time you groaned and cried out for him he seemed to get bolder, to touch you with more surety. He kissed his way back up between your breasts, gripping your nape with one hand while he tugged the undone button down off his shoulders with the other. With his mouth busy at your collar bones he dipped a broad thumb into the wetness between your thighs, circling your clit just how he knew you liked, long slow sweeps that sent pleasure skittering hotly down your limbs, that had heat flooding in your core.

 

 

“Who do you pray to?” Sweeney rasped, lips searing against your throat, fingers gripping your nape like a vice, steeling you as you writhed on his lap, seeking more friction, more hardness, just _more_ , “Who do you worship?”

 

 

You felt that ritual rising in your veins once more, flowing thick and sweet like molasses, and you welcomed its flood, opened your arms to its balmy kiss, noting with no small measure of relief how much you’d fucking _missed_ it roaring through your limbs, cloying your chest.

 

 

Scenes were flickering to life behind your eyelids, markedly different from the last time you’d experienced them, but no less vibrant. A vast heavy wood broken only by the soft light of the full moon, it’s gentle glow illuminating the sea of green that roiled beneath it, a green the exact shade and hue of the eyes staring intently into yours now. Fires splitting the night sky, glimmering like faceted rubies adorning the coal black flesh of Nyx’s throat, the pale naked flesh of the worshippers that danced by her light gleaming like stars in her obsidian hair, like opalescent drops of pearly blood slipping down her slated cheeks.

 

 

“ _You_ ,” you husked, your fingers working at the clasp of his pants, undoing their outdated closure with a practiced deftness, your hips reluctant to cease their undulations, your sex pounding and wet for him, “I pray to you, I worship for you.”

 

 

“Fuck, I need more,” Sweeney grated, palming your ass hard and biting down fervently at the juncture of your shoulder, teeth dull and grating against the sinew there, “I need more. Say my name _mo Éinín,_ say it like I’m your god, like you’re my votary.”

 

 

“I am,” you panted against his skin, your mouth seeking that place on his neck where his pulse pounded the strongest, needing that palpable proof that this was real, that it wasn’t just some fever dream that you’d jolt awake from, “You are. I’m yours _Buile Shuibhne_ , my body, my faith, my prayers. I’m your sacrifice,” you drew out the throbbing length of his cock from his pants, not bothering to slip his trews any farther down his rippling thighs than necessary, impatient for the perfect slip of his hard shaft in your wet cunt. You shifted onto your knees and drew your panties aside, hovering just above him, circling the head of his cock around your wet sex once, twice, before sinking blissfully down onto his shaft, needy moaning mewls slipping from your lips as you drew him in to the hilt.

 

 

“Fuck,” you panted as you rocked your hips back and forth, reveling in the tight fit of your bodies, in the throbbing wedge of him deep inside you, sliding slowly up his shaft only to ram back down, repeating the agonizing motion until your thighs shook, “Oh that’s so fucking good.”

 

 

“I can feel you, little lassling,” Sweeney growled, his muscles bunching, coiling with tension as he tried hard to gentle the responding thrusts of his hips, the pressing drive of his shaft inside you as you slammed back down onto him, “Fuck, you feel better than I remembered. Your pleasure, your devotion, it’s too fucking good. Feels like fire through my veins, flooding my limbs,” his hand tightened at your nape, a rigid bar at your back, steeling you as he pounded his hips up mercilessly into you without warning, the snap of his shaft searing and brutal and so damned good.

 

 

“Oh _that_ ,” you groaned, arching into him, bowing your back into his unfettered, harsh thrust, “Do _that_ again,” you commanded, your fingers digging into the muscles of his back, the broadness of his shoulders, your sex slickening with each determined sweep of his thumb against your clit. You moaned low and long as he complied, holding your body still above him, supporting you with the iron bands of his arms as he pistioned beneath you, fueled by your rapt attention and utter fealty, his wounds beginning to heal as you gave into the sanctity of the virile rite unfolding between you, the sacredness of the ritual being practiced.

 

 

“I can feel your little cunt tightening around me,” Sweeney husked against your skin, teeth pressing like hot steel into your flesh, “Your sweet sex tensing to cum. Are you close, my little bird? Do you want to cum for me?”

 

 

“Y-yes,” you mewled, your teeth chattering from the force of his thrusts, your cunt pulsing as you teetered on the edge of a powerful release, spurred by the wet slide of his thumb at the apex of your folds, the harsh, grating thrust of his shaft deep in your pussy, “Please, please I need to cum.”

 

 

“I want you to,” he cooed, slipping his lips against your jaw, pressing a kiss to your neck, “Dedicate it to me,” he rasped, a devil at your ear, “Pledge this sweet cunt, and the pleasure it rends, to me.”

 

 

“O-oh fuck, it’s yours,” you cried out, tilting your head back, exposing more of your throat to his hungry mouth, so damned close you could taste it, wanting it hot and wet against your flesh, “My cunt and the slip of my sex,” you were sure you would rip through the muscle of his shoulder, what with how hard you were gripping him, but he only seemed to spur you on, to want more of that sharp sensation as he bounced you on his shaft, encouraged your unbidden abandon, “My hard fucking orgasms. They’re yours and yours alone.”

 

 

“That’s my fucking girl,” he snapped as he wrenched you down onto his shaft once more, his fingers biting into your skin, his thumb searing against your clit, his shaft that plunged within you demanding your release, wringing it from your pulsing sex mercilessly. You saw blinding white stars dancing behind your eyelids as you came, cursing wickedly, clenching your thighs around his hips as your cunt pulsed wildly around him, commanding him to follow you, and with an even more wicked curse he did, spilling hot jets of cum into your wet clenching sex.

 

 

As you slowly came down from your post orgasmic high you realized that while you were almost completely naked, Sweeney was almost completely clothed, the stark juxtaposition making you start with something that was much more molten and affectionate to be simply pure lust. You slumped into his arms as your breaths slowed and your pulse pounded in your ears, nearly drowning out the gentle praises he was huffing into your hair, tracing into your skin as his fingers whirled down your back, up your arms.

 

 

You weren’t entirely sure what _this_ was now, much more significant than friends with benefits, more emotionally charged than a mere booty call, but still not quite enough to be a solid relationship, not that you were pushing it in that direction. And yet, you couldn’t help but wonder if you meant something to him as he slipped his lips along your temple and wrapped his arms around your middle, curling his fingers in the dips of your waist, tripping up your ribs.

 

 

“You got your worship, now about that ride to Wisconsin,” you intoned between the harsh huffs of your slowing breaths, your words a vain attempt to distract yourself from the disturbing warmth blooming in your chest, dangerously close to your hammering heart, at his gentleness, his reverence to you now. Your luring attempt at light conversation was rewarded with a soft lilting chuckle from the satisfied giant panting beneath your thighs, and you felt his wry grin curving into your hair as he answered.

 

 

“You don’t have to do anything, lassling, I’ll find a way there myself. You’ve given me more than enough for the journey,” he sounded sated, restored almost, like you’d actually healed him somehow, like your insane play at symbiotic fulfillment had actually worked.

 

 

“No really, let’s take my car, I can drive you-”

 

 

“No! No,” Sweeney’s hands tightened protectively around you as if he was afraid of the implications of your words, his fingers digging hard into your skin, slipping urgently over the dips of your waist in placation, “With the current state of my luck we wouldn’t even make it out of the fucking county.”

 

 

You let that settle in your mind, turning over various possibilities as you traced constellations in the hectic patterns strewn about his freckled skin, wondering poignantly how such a surly male could possibly hold the very heavens on his brawny shoulders, “Then take my car.”

 

  
You couldn’t even really believe that you’d just suggested it, so you didn’t blame him for starting hard, leaning back sharply to gauge your seriousness, roiling green eyes searching yours fervently.

 

  
“Are you sure?” he questioned, arms skating up to your shoulders, burying in your loose hair, “That’s more of a commitment than anyone has been willing to make towards me in centuries.”

 

 

You nodded eagerly, finally finding the strength to slip your legs off of his, bracing a knee on the couch beside him as you lowered one foot gingerly to the floor, testing the strength of the appendage, “Hell yeah, you’ve got a coin to reclaim and I’ve got a shift to start,” you glanced at the clock over by the stove, noting that you had just enough time to shower and be there as scheduled for prep, “Take it, I can catch a ride from Jack.”

 

 

“I won’t take it any farther than Madison, and I’ll let you know where I drop it at,” he swore urgently, that new ignited light shining determinately in his eyes making your most likely idiotically placed trust completely worth it. Despite the fact that he was once again going to leave you with a sore cunt and a deeply satisfied body you felt strangely chipper, happy. Perhaps that was because you’d just had yet another toe curling orgasm, but some small part of you suspected that a perk of the whole worship going both ways thing was that you got a rush of god-fueled endorphins after each ‘session.’

 

 

“Just promise me that this time when you go to get your coin back, you won’t do anything like when you got it back from me,” you pleaded as you lowered your other foot to the ground, your limbs successfully converted back to a solid instead of a liquid, your comment truly nothing more than a slightly jealousy tinged teasing jab. Sweeney seemed to take it more seriously though, as he leaned in, tucking a finger under your chin to draw your face closer to him as he pressed his lips against yours once, his kiss sweet and slow, a lilting remnant of the thick reverent ritual still slurring through your veins, still crackling in the air as you kissed.

 

 

“Don’t worry darlin’,” Sweeney rasped against your lips, one glinting green eye sliding closed as he slipped you a wry wink, his customary roguish bravado firmly back in place, “I don’t play with dead things.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello Lovely Readers,
> 
> WHEW, what a chapter! Who else can't get enough of dirty talking Sweeney? What did we think of this chapter? Was this "sacrifice/prayer" session just as good as the first? Better?! Worse?! Too much smut, not enough smut, not enough banter? And that ending! I had to throw in a Dead Wife reference ;) Let me know your thoughts, I love to hear them! THANK YOU for all your wonderful support so far! You all are AMAZING!
> 
> Everyone - I need your help! I would love to write more chapters, but I only have enough ideas in me for about two more fleshed out chapters. If you have anything that you would like to see, or are dying to read, and I mean anything, please tell me in the comments! Nothing is ever 'dumb' or 'too small', I mean I wrote a whole chapter of Drunk Sweeney for Bran's sake! Any and all ideas/requests will be considered! And if you can't think of anything, no sweat! Your continued support is more than enough :) <3
> 
> THANK YOU!! Love you all!
> 
> Mood Board for this chapter:
> 
> http://imagines-oneshots-blog.tumblr.com/post/163035247049/all-that-glitters-chapter-5-dried-blood-day  
>  
> 
> \- Quick note on this mood board (this is my last author's blurb, I promise!) - I usually try to stay away from clearly defined faces and features in my mood boards, as they're meant to give you the general 'mood' (hehe) of the chapter through vague but meaningful images, but the lovely lady in this edition had the exact expression AND t shirt that I was envisioning, so in she went. Keep in mind that she is more like a place holder for the 'reader', if that makes any sense! Enjoy!


	6. Vol VI

Chapter Six: An Unexpected Text, A Friend’s Advice, and A Dangerous Proposition

 

You should have known that when Jack offered to drive you to pick up your car five counties over in Madison it was really less of an innocent favor and more of a slyly masked, vehemently intoned excuse to warn you about the dangers of making nice with some of the Crocodile’s more undesirable patrons.

 

“What did I tell you, Kitty,” Jack drawled, glancing at you knowingly from the corner of her eye where she sat behind the wheel of her breakdown prone Jeep, which was currently doing a surprisingly good job at carrying the two of you to where your vehicle had been stowed by none other than the very male your boss-turned-friend was currently lecturing you about, “He is nothing but trouble. Easy on the eyes, sure, those thick muscles are hard for any woman to ignore, but he’s still trouble all the same.”

 

“I’m being careful,” you assured her after a beat measured silence, markedly cautious not to delve into exactly which aspects of your non-relationship with Sweeney you were being flagrantly care _less_ in, preferring to keep your penchant for touches that were all too gentle and sex that was decidedly, intensely, unprotected to yourself for the moment, “I don’t intend to get burned.”

 

“Good women never do,” Jack quipped, the wisdom that rolled off of her tongue like honey seeming effortless, overflowing with the laborious, redolent weight of experience, “But in the end we always are. Every time,” she seemed to scrape her thumb over the empty slip of skin adorning the ring finger of her left hand without realizing it, a tell that you’d noticed a few months back which made itself known whenever she was particularly worried, and once again your eyes flicked to the band of flesh slashing there on her finger, the band that was paler than the rest of her strong, weathered hand. The band that was in the distinct shape of a painfully absent wedding ring.

 

“Trust me, I know what this is between me and him,” you needed that acrid lie that rolled empty and fallow off your tongue to reassure yourself just as much as the dubious older woman by your side, wanting the biting drive of those strongly intoned words to reinforce the stalwart walls you’d erected around your heart, to guard the lovesick appendage that beat valiantly in your breast, “I’m nothing but a bossy waitress to him, and he’s just another drunk patron to me.” Jack’s responding incredulous snort snapped your gaze up from where it had been fixed in your lap, on your nervously wringing hands.

 

“Any person with at least one working eye and half a brain can tell that’s a lie,” she crooned in her whiskey smooth voice between the lowly grated chuckles tumbling from beneath her smile, using a hand to flip her peppered curls over one sinuous shoulder, tipping her head to catch the warm mid-summer breeze that swept in through the Jeep’s open windows, “There’s something going on there between the two of you,” the accusing glance she cast your way cut deeper than you were comfortable admitting, and you squirmed in your seat in response, trying hard to stem the smile that wanted to bloom on your lips at the thought of your flame haired surly Leprechaun and the hot, wanting, illicit _things_ going on between you, “I don’t know exactly what, but it’s sure as hell more than your standard ‘waitress’ and ‘drunken patron’ relations, I can tell you that much.”

 

At her accusing words you just couldn’t stop the grin that had been threatening to curve your quirking lips, and you let it bloom wry and indignant for just a moment as you gazed out the window, watching with a measure of poorly concealed, secret delight the dark blurs of various buildings and the occasional emerald slip of farmland roiling in the distance as they whirred by just beyond the darkened glass. Judging by the incrementally decreasing numbers on the mile markers flashing by on the side of the highway, you were almost to where Sweeney had left your car. That is, if the text he’d sent you, the one flitting beneath your anxious fingers, was to be trusted.

 

The brief combination of letters bore just a few precious details – mile marker, city, just outside of Madison, as promised, and a short greeting that still made your toes curl to read it – but you were immensely grateful for it nonetheless. You knew that you’d taken a huge leap of faith in trusting Sweeney with something as valuable and destructible as your car, and you still had no idea whose phone he’d had to beg, borrow, or steal to get that simple text message to you, but the very fact that it had graced your inbox in such a timely manner was enough to lift your burdened spirits.

 

That’s why Jack’s teasing words and innuendo drenched warnings did little to stem the stubborn warmth that burrowed in your chest, upturned the corners of your lips, that had you waiting on the edge of your seat to see if Sweeney had _actually_ kept his word for once.

 

When Jack huffed and turned her Jeep into the nearly vacant parking lot indicated in the text message glinting on the screen in your lap, the lot bearing your vehicle in one lamplight bathed corner, you had to work hard not to let a biting ‘I told you so’ slip from your lips, figuring that you owed the wizened bar owner that much for her troubles. You settled for a smirk and a knowing look cast briefly in her direction instead, to which she could only grimace and grate in reply, “I still think he’s a jackass.”

 

“Oh he absolutely is,” you chattered as you slipped your bag over your shoulder and straightened the hem of your sundress, just a little something you’d thrown on in the errant chance that Sweeney decided to make an appearance along with your borrowed vehicle, “But he’s a jackass who keeps his word.”

 

As if in an effort to douse the joy and relief singing through your veins Jack caught your arm sharply as you skipped around the driver’s side window, her grip sturdy and shackling, almost anxious as it slipped around your wrist, “Whatever you do, whatever happens there, just be careful. I don’t want to have to bust another asshole’s balls because he went and hurt one of my girls.”

  
You had begun to laugh, lilting disbelieving giggles, but the deadly seriousness glinting in her dark unwavering eyes had you biting your lip hard to stem your chitters, nodding with an equal measure of sincerity as you replied, “I think he’d object to that as well,” but at the prodding raise of her slim eyebrow you added a truly candid, “I will be, I promise.”

 

This seemed to sate her, as after a long moment spent searching your face for any hints of dishonesty she dissented, releasing your wrist and changing the station from your choice of soft rock to her beloved bluegrass as she prepared to speed away. You uttered your fervent thanks to her, which she waved off with a stalwart hand and the fluttering of her peppered curls, and you swore to text once you were home, bidding her goodbye with a genuine, warm smile curving your lips.

 

Your friendly grin morphed into something more nebulous, more heated, as you swiped a thumb over the text burning a hole in your inbox, your digit caressing the stark greeting blinking at the top of the screen.  

 

 _My little bird_ …

 

You still weren’t sure exactly how you fit into the chaotic pattern of Sweeney’s life, or how he fit into yours, but this, the small epithet and the searing fervent sensations that it wrought deep within your chest, near your hammering heart, were enough for now.

 

The rest of his message was blunt and somewhat coarse, much like the man himself, but thanks to that sincere molten moniker winking up at you, you found that you didn’t really mind.

 

Sighing, trying and ultimately failing to push aside heated memories of those saccharine words whispered raggedly against your skin, searing into your pliant flesh amidst the molten coil of your sweaty tangled limbs, of huge hungry hands parting your eager thighs and sage and sunlight eyes meeting yours with no shortage of affection brimming in their depths, you slipped your phone into your purse and strode to your car, grinning the whole way over. You had just retrieved your car key out from under the wheel well of the front tire, also exactly where it had been indicated in that esteemed text message, when you felt it; a sliver of panic rending the still night, a whisper of discord sliding down your spine.

 

You stilled, wondering with naïve hope if it was Sweeney, if he was here, but you’d been in his presence, felt the heavy press of his godhead sparking gilded and venerable against your skin enough to know that this, this tense, acrid coil of power, this screaming innovation, was utterly unknown and very, very dangerous.

 

If Sweeney’s power tasted like sweet fertile earth and fresh cream, like green rolling hills and ancient ritual and songs sung in fervent loving worship, this tasted like smog and metal and burning plastic, like icy pallid fear gripping your chest as you stared down the barrel of a gun pointed right between your eyes. This felt like new power, unfettered by the stalwart wisdom of time and gritty privation of struggle.

 

Your heart seized in your chest as that sudden sensation that you were not alone anymore, that someone, _something_ , was here slid down your spine, coiled in your muscles. Your pulse began to quicken, pounding jagged and wild in your ears, and you tensed to run, though that logical part of your mind tried vainly to reason that it was only in your head, that you were just imagining it.

  
That part of you shut the hell up when you heard the distinct grating _clack_ of high heels smacking the pavement.

 

“There you are, you sneak,” a strangely familiar, eerily bright voice crooned behind you, each click of those infernal heels bringing that unwelcome presence closer to your terror seized form, “I’ve been looking for you for ages, darling!”

 

Dimly you realized that your hands had begun shaking and you curled your fingers tightly into your palms in an attempt to soothe that telling quake, to stem the fear and anxiety skittering in your chest, cloying thickly in your throat. Somehow you found the courage to face that presence, turning slowly, measuredly, as if in foresight of the trembling shock that would flood your veins when you saw who stood just a few feet away from you.

 

It was Holly Golightly, or more accurately Audrey Hepburn playing Holly Golightly in the 1961 Breakfast at Tiffany’s. It was impossible, unbelievable, and yet there she was, long black dress just barely brushing the cracking asphalt beneath her, milky pearls strung around her slim neck, framing the lean lines of her face, every detail precise and accurate, right down to the opulent tiara glinting in the caramel hued nest of her manicured coif, as if she’d stepped right out of the screen to approach you in the shitty parking lot of a Wisconsin supermarket.

 

As you studied her, mouth agape in disbelief, mind rioting against the picture she cut before you, you began to notice a few discrepancies. There was a bit too much blonde in the highlights of her hair, just the slightest tint of blue to her eyes where there should be only hazel and brown, a hooking sharpness to her nose that should be delicate and pert. You latched onto those differences, needing them to steel your reeling mind and help you find your voice to question, “What the fuck?”

 

“Oh, golly gee damn!” Holly-but-not-really-Holly quipped, flashing you the slashing upturn of a wry smile as she spoke, revealing the blinding slip of her sharp teeth, “What a dirty mouth you have, darling! Someone must have a case of the mean reds tonight.”

 

“You’re not real,” you chanted more to yourself than anything, beginning to feel that churning panic spreading through your body, seeping into your bones, burrowing deep in your limbs, “You can’t be real,” you thought you heard the melancholy notes of Moon River playing softly in the distance and briefly you wondered if you’d just suffered a complete psychological break.

 

“I’m as real as a heart attack,” she replied with a wink, bracing one gloved elbow in the crook of her waist and taking a hearty drag from the small roll of tobacco dancing at the end of her absurdly long cigarette holder, “And we’ve got some important matters to discuss, you and I.”

 

You couldn’t reply, couldn’t say anything due to the fear clutching at your back, choking any words that might try to escape from your lips, but non-Holly didn’t seem to care, she just took a few steps closer and blew her smoke politely to the side as she regarded you with blatant appraisal, “You’re in a unique position darling, a position of _power_ , and that is a delicate and vital place for any girl to be. Now, I have an offer to put to you, and you’d be a damn fool not to take it, a damn fool indeed,” she raised one slim brow at you and flashed you what was almost a playful smile before she continued,  “From what I hear you know a certain Leprechaun, one Mad Sweeney, is that right?”

 

From the biting accusation sitting heavy in her tone you could instantly tell that she meant _know_ in the more biblical sense, and before you could even open your mouth and pluck up the courage to question how the hell she had found that out she was flicking some ash off the end of her cigarette and speaking once more, “That Leprechaun is a damn fool, but he’s also the man of a Mr. Wednesday, who happens to be an important player in our little game. Does that name sound familiar to you?”

 

You shook your head, bracing your hands on the cool metal of your car behind you, wanting something solid, something big and comforting to steel your shaking form. Holly-not-Holly leaned in, peering at you intently, as if trying to decide whether you were telling the truth or not, “Oh no, you don’t have a liars face, darling, not at all. Why, you have the face of an angel!”

You jumped hard when out of nowhere a fluffy slip of ginger batted valiantly at the cigarette swaying on the end of the long holder balanced precariously in its owners hand, meowing coarsely when it missed its mark. In response non-Holly shooed the chagrined feline away with the gentle shove of one dainty foot and turned back to you when she was done and the cat had disappeared into the background once more to her chastising calls of _poor slob_.

 

“Now, I have a proposition for you, darling, and the proposition is this. Go to your man, your Sweeney, and find out everything you can about this Mr. Wednesday. Find out his habits, his plans, how he takes his nightcaps and what cologne he wears, find out every last detail that you possibly can. You do this, you join our side, the _right_ side, and your rewards will be endless.”

 

The temptation to find out exactly what was waiting behind her promising words glinted briefly in your mind, testing the limits of your loyalty, your resolve, but when you saw something greedy and disturbingly machinating flash behind her eyes, something that you imagined that prey saw just before they were ensnared by their predators, you shook yourself hard and decided that _this_ , whatever the _fuck_ it was, needed to stay far away from you.

 

“I have no interest in-” non-Holly cut you off with the graceful wave of one elegant, satin clad hand, slipping a strand of caramel tinged hair out of her eyes before she spoke, “Such decisions, decisions of life and death that is, are not to be made brashly. Indeed, they are best made after a good night’s sleep and a tall glass of bourbon. So think on it, darling, and I’ll be in touch. And of course, I’ll be watching,” she said, casting a meaningful glance down to the phone sitting in your open bag, which swung gently on your shoulder, before she turned to go, heels clicking on the pavement in bitter syncopation to the fervent pounding of your heart.

 

Just as you were about to release a breath that you didn’t realize you had been holding Holly-not-Holly turned back to you, glancing over her shoulder in a picturesque stance that belonged on the cover of a poster. She was beautiful and terrifying and deeply unsettling as she gazed at you with her whirring, calculating eyes and sharp cheekbones.

 

“Never love a wild thing,” she crooned, her stunning, frigid face heartbreaking, “Truly you must never give your heart to them. The more you do, the stronger they get, until they’re strong enough to run into the woods or fly into a tree, and then to a higher tree and then right into the sky,” you recognized the quote, you knew that she was just parroting stolen words, repeating them out of context so that they held no meaning, but somehow they still cut you down to your very marrow, ringing bitterly with an acrid kernel of hard, cold truth, “Never love a wild thing, darling, remember that I said that.”

 

And then she was gone, slipping away with a gentle cloud of smoke billowing about her slim shoulders and a bright slip of orange slinking about her ankles, leaving you with a hammering heart, a strange sense of foreboding and a long, fervent string of fear tinged questions. The foremost among them, the one that was ringing the loudest in your mind, the one that spurred your fists to clench tighter and your legs to shake, was what the _hell_ had you gotten yourself into here?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello Lovely Readers!
> 
> First off, you all are AMAZING! Thank you so much for all of your feedback on the last chapter, it really means the world to me to have readers that are so willing to let me know their thoughts and share their comments with me, so THANK YOU! To everyone who gave me ideas, you rock! Keep an eye out for your ideas coming to fruition here in the fic! I can't promise that everyone's ideas will be seen through, but I will do my best to do you, the series and this fic justice. To those of you who gave your support, you rock! I couldn't keep writing without you and your all too generous praises, you inspire me constantly!
> 
> That being said, what did we think of this chapter??! We finally see a new god, and it's Media! Was she scary enough, imposing enough? And we have a little more Jack/Reader friendship development, what do you all think of that? Love it? Hate it? I know that there are only mentions of Sweeney in this chapter, but it will serve as an important tie in to the next few chapters, and a catalyst for the reader in the near future. AKA please don't kill me for the distinct lack of a certain tall, muscled, foul mouthed, dirty talking Irishman, there's a method to my madness!
> 
> Also, after a lot of deliberation, in order to do both this fic and the show their proper due, I think I'm going to add about five more chapters and then put this fic on a temporary hiatus until the show comes back. That being said, I will draw this fic out so that the down time isn't too long and you'll have plenty of great stuff to hold you over. If you hate this idea, tell me! If you love it, or don't have any feelings either way, also tell me! As the wonderful cullen-bohannons pointed out, I do not want to do a retelling of the season, or presume how events will transpire, so I will have to find creative (and sexy!) ways to get around this pitfall. Do stick with me, there is some awesome stuff (some of it requested by you!) coming your way! Also shout out to BBV for this particular idea of Media being involved, you're awesome!
> 
> THANK YOU, and enjoy!
> 
> Mood Board for this chapter!
> 
> http://imagines-oneshots-blog.tumblr.com/post/163349798729/all-that-glitters-chapter-six-an-unexpected-text


	7. Vol VII

Chapter Seven: Vodka, Black Coffee and A Whiff of Death

 

 

By Bran’s fine fucking beard, Sweeney _really_ had to stop getting himself into situations like these.

 

Namely, situations where he found himself saddled with the short end of the stick, running on not nearly enough sleep and nursing one hell of a hangover, and in this particular instance, dodging the daggers that Dead Wife threw his way from across the sticky table with those dull cloudy eyes of hers.

 

Salim-not-Salim had taken advantage of the brimming beat of awkward silence that followed Dead Wife’s self-proclaimed love of anal sex, a fucking lie no doubt, falling sardonic and fallow off her dry cracking lips, and was now subjecting them to a monologue on the joys of his newfound freedom in life, as if that would convince _her_ to do anything other than whatever the fuck she wanted.

 

The arrogant hag was no doubt still miffed about Sweeney’s blunt and admittedly coarse observations that her man had in fact left her, had tasted the bitter kiss of death playing about her lips and fled like the fucker that he was, but really it was for her own good. There were secrets hidden behind that wall she kept scratching at, secrets that would spill out if she kept pawing at them; vile putrid things, not altogether unlike the telltale whiff of expired mortality that just wouldn’t stop wafting from her rotting flesh that lay heaped casually against the dingy booth’s peeling vinyl as if it belonged swilling rot gut vodka on its surface instead of dutifully desecrating six feet under the cursed ground.

 

But his words were all he had to stop her stubborn scrapings, and while even he could be charming when he wanted to, his roguish powers of persuasion seemed to be utterly useless when it came to her. She’d just blink those deadened eyes up at him and twist her mouth into a cruel line before spitting some venomous insult in his direction. In truth, Sweeney’s real strength lay in the intimidating brawn of his thick roiling muscles and that wild glint that he knew played behind his eyes all too often, but coincidentally both were also proving to be useless against her at the present. His current luck was as rotten as her slowly decaying flesh.

 

Besides, he could still feel the grating bite of her callous foot against his bruised bones, could still sense the pain lashing at his back from the unholy fucking force of that effortless flick of her cursed fingers, the careless swat of her palm that made agony bloom like fire in his muscles, deep in the sinew of his muscles. He was in no hurry to find himself beneath her boot again, of that he was sure.

 

No, for now he’d just sip his damned Southern Comfort and try his hardest not to scan the too-familiar pub that his unwanted companions had delivered him to, one Jack’s Crocodile Bar, for even the smallest glimpse of a certain waitress who always seemed to have a quick retort and an even quicker smile waiting for him. Of _you_ , with your knowing eyes and soft skin and fiery, fervent prayers.  _Fuck_ , he almost fucking shivered to think of your worship, of the sordid sensation it wrought from his battered body and the joyful celebration it sparked deep in his weathered soul. He could do with a prayer or two at the moment, Bran only fucking knew how badly he needed it, how much he had begun to _crave_ it, to feel it’s poignant absence like the high wail of widow keening by her lover’s grave at midnight, the shriek of a Banshee rending the milky dawn.

 

Dead Wife had been stronger than he anticipated; heaving himself up from her crushing blows had taken all the power of his stubborn will plus a little extra something he didn’t know he’d still had in him, and now what did he have to show for it? His damned coin was still lying in the crumbling soup of her decaying sternum, Ibrahim bin whatever-the-fuck was embarking on yet another diatribe that Sweeney was not nearly tipsy enough to sit through, and the dull pounding pulse of a splitting headache was just beginning to bloom somewhere near his temples.

 

All in all, Sweeney was having a shit morning.

 

“I’ve gotta piss,” Sweeney announced without ceremony, suddenly unbearably sick of looking at Dead Wife’s saggy bloated skin and dead eyes, eyes that saw too much, that sparked waves of acrid guilt to spear straight down to his belly to splay about his restless limbs. The stale scent of her spoiling meat cloyed in his nostrils, mixed putrescently with the cigarette dangling from her cadaverous fingers, its sharp smoke wafting from between her papery lips, battering his fraying senses with gnawing insinuations and lashing shame. He was the reason her heart, which in truth had been frozen solid long before she was dead, lay still in her chest now, that her flesh was icy to the touch and her pallor was tinged with just a hint of green, and if he kept looking at her he was either going to confess his sins and apologize or punch her right in her sneering mouth, and neither one of those options would end particularly well for him or his battered ballocks.

 

So Sweeney tore to the men’s room, the floor of which he’d become very well acquainted with just a few nights ago, steadfastly ignoring the watchful glances that this shit hole’s owner Jack threw his way as he passed by her where she stood behind the bar. She held no love for him, he could sense that much, especially after he’d been pinned at the end of her mean looking double barrel riffle not too long ago, but there was something else lilting in the older woman’s eyes. Something personal, something _protective._

 

Before Sweeney could give that strange glance and it’s perplexing implications any further thought he felt two slim fingers hook into the back of his pants and yank him none so gently into the ladies room propped right beside his intended destination. The hefty weight of his hangover combined with sizzling shock and his low center of gravity, located just shy of six feet up in the air somewhere in the vicinity of his chest instead of some four feet off the ground by the seat of his pants, did him no favors as he stumbled in the direction that surprisingly strong arm was pulling him, and briefly he wondered who the fuck he’d pissed off to deserve this manhandling.

 

His first thought after the customary blustering _what the fuck_ ’s had echoed loudly in his mind was that somehow the ladies room was _so_ much cleaner than the men’s room; the floor less sticky, the fluorescent lights markedly brighter. There were no orphaned beers propped lazily in empty hand towel dispensers or stray pieces of toilet paper abandoned on the linoleum floor. But there _was_ a friendly looking vase of some middle America wild flower propped up efficaciously near the lemon and honey scented soap dispensers balanced on the edge of each sink, and an ambitious display of extra supplies stashed handily beneath unbroken mirror. He made a quick, slightly jealous mental note to use this more sanitary washroom whenever possible from now on.

 

His second thought was why the hell was he swaying where he stood in this markedly more pleasant bathroom instead of suffering through the sharp scent of urinal cake adding insult to his already throbbing temples in the men’s room just one door over? When he turned around to face his assailant, however, his ire-fueled questions were immediately answered in a way that he’d be lying to say didn’t please him right down to his battered, ancient boots.

 

His little bird had come back to him.

 

* * *

 

 

_“Do you have a phone?”_

 

Your voice was urgent, quavering with a wide slip of pallid fear that you felt skittering down your spine, soaking deep into the marrow of your bones. You didn’t bother with pleasantries; really they would have just slowed you down, and you needed answers, like, _yesterday_. There was just too much that you didn’t know, too many factors beyond your control, too many things that didn’t add up, and right now _this_ , you and Sweeney and the Crocodile surrounding you, were the only things that made sense in the suddenly dark whetted tangle of the world. Besides, you knew that Sweeney wasn’t one to be _precious_ about that sort of thing.

 

But to your urgent annoyance the red headed giant just leaned back against one chipped sink to regard you, blinking slowly as his no doubt alcohol addled brain struggled to keep up with your hastily intoned words. You raised your eyebrows in a prodding gesture, jutting your chin towards his jacket in a less than gentle reminder that your question was not of the rhetorical variety.

 

“No, little bird,” he replied in a smile-tinged voice after a beat of stunned silence, thick auburn brows raised in a heated mixture of impression and amusement at your unexpected presence, his big hands moving to rest on your hips with an effortless ease that had a fervent plume of warmth blooming low in your belly, fiercely combatting the fear that roiled thick and clotted in your chest, “I can’t stand those damned things. The letters are too fucking small for my fingers.”

 

“Good,” you murmured, slipping out of his hands distractedly, though you missed their reassuring weight upon your body as soon as they were gone, “I don’t think she can track me now.” Your brow furrowed as you began to pace, traversing the meager length of tile and porcelain nervously as you spoke, calling to mind the smashed mess of silicon and plastic that used to serve as your cell phone, now hastily discarded in a nearby Crocodile waste bin.

 

“She?” Sweeney questioned, throwing one ankle over the other as he regarded you where he was propped against a sink, and you felt the heated slip of his eyes rake down your form with a knowing practiced want, a desire that was born from the lusty repetition of learned sordid behaviors. It seemed that you’d trained him well; one molten sweep of his gaze and you’d been known to fall straight into his brawny arms with a sigh and a swoon.

 

But not this time. You had bigger matters to discuss than petty, lucky coin themed vendettas or curious ponderings explored over a saucer of fresh cream. What you needed to discuss was burning innovation and searing propositions and ripe, real fear as stark and biting as the crack of a gun heaved across your temple.

 

“Yes,” you hissed, running a shaking hand through your hair, painfully aware of the haggard picture that you cut just them; a small duffel bag brimming with hastily paced clothes and a few choice valuables thrown at your booted feet, ripped jeans carelessly pulled over your wriggling hips and a dirty, sleep rumpled t shirt flapping about your torso, but at that moment with Holly-not-Holly’s sharp words ringing maliciously in your ears and the jagged edge of her perfect smile blazoned behind your eyelids, you didn’t give a single shit, “Her. The woman who looked like Audrey fucking Hepburn. The _thing_ that scared the shit out of me last night in the parking lot where you left my car, the one near Madison.”

 

Sweeney was looking at you strangely as you spoke, a disturbing stillness falling over his form as your words seemed to click some dawning realization into place within his whirring mind. He _knew_ what you were referring to, of that you were suddenly sure. Whether or not he would _tell_ you what he knew was a different story altogether.

 

“Christ you’re nearly shaking, lassling,” Sweeney murmured beneath the husky grate of his breath, something almost worried prowling in his tone, “This woman,” Sweeney asked, his sage and sunshine eyes nearly glowing in the soft light of the bathroom, some molten emotion giving a dangerous weight to his gaze, making it churn with a crazed frenzy that you’d only seen there in the throbbing heat of intimacy, with his sweat slicked skin pressed hotly against yours and fragile tendrils of power slipping about your collarbones, “Did she resemble this figure almost perfectly, with a few key differences?”

 

“Yes,” you replied, your grating voice tinged with an unfettered measure of panic and agitation as you ceased your pacing’s and faced him, suddenly hopeful that he would actually provide you with the answers you so desperately sought, “She asked me to spy on you, to find out information on someone you know named Mr. Wednesday,” Sweeney’s gaze turned cold at the mention of that strange name, a deep steely disdain flashing there the likes of which you’d never seen, and it had you pausing briefly before a small measure of warmth returned to the emerald and gold of his gaze, spurring you to speak once more, “What was she, Sweeney? Cause she sure as shit wasn’t human.”

 

Sweeney raked a blustering hand through his russet locks, cursed wickedly under his breath as he shifted back onto both feet. You weren’t sure what he’d do, if he’d just leave without another word or outright refuse to tell you anything, but his next actions shocked you so thoroughly that it took you the full length of a few heartbeats to react.

 

“I’m sorry that she’s scared you so much, _mo_ _Éinín,_ _”_ Sweeney rumbled, taking a few careful steps towards you, motions smooth and practiced, as if he were trying to calm a wild beast, only moving a huge spread hand towards your quaking form once he saw the naked need flashing in your gaze, the frightened shake of your slim shoulders, “I didn’t want you to get mixed up in all of this. A right royal mess, it is.” His touch was almost comforting, and the welcome blistering succor of it was so contenting that you had to work hard to bite back the sigh that wanted to slip from your lips then.

 

“Well I think I’m firmly in it now,” you shot back, your voice barely above a whisper as you spoke, reveling in the slip of his palm around your nape, the burning warmth of the huge chest that he pressed you into, and you curled your fingers into the worn slip of fabric near the small of his back as he wrapped his other arm around your waist, allowing yourself to give in to the quiet, thrumming and utterly unexpected comfort of his body, “Just tell me what’s going on, Sweeney. Whatever you’ve done, however you’re involved in this, whatever is happening - I can handle it if you’re honest with me.”

 

Sweeney’s fingers curled beneath your chin to angle your eyes up towards him, your faces hovering so close together that you could almost feel the lilting warmth of his exhalations, could practically taste the sweet berries that seemed to perpetually dance on his deft tongue. Somehow, despite the grime caking his ruddy skin and the unshakeable air of roadswept dirt that seemed to unendingly cling to him, he always managed to smell like summer sunshine and tall rolling grass and briny churning seas that lapped gleefully at distant cliff faces. By now you should have been accustomed to the virile strength of his hulking form, to the gargantuan stature of his strong body, but every time you saw him again they somehow managed to surprise you anew, to send fresh waves of budding, verdant lust skittering down your spine, and this instance, it seemed, was no different. The only thing that stopped you from indulging in the warm slip of his huge body like you so fervently wanted to, from falling steadfastly into the strong circle of his arms, were those raw shards of icy fear that coiled in your mind, dug deep into your spine.

 

“Is my life in danger?” you questioned, your voice a mere whisper against the silken slip of his garnet spun beard, the rugged line of his tempting mouth, “Is your life in danger?” That prospect was somehow more frightening to you, more disturbing, because if a monolith like him could fall, who indeed was safe from the oncoming tide? Who would survive this impending doom that clung lie a vice to your back, crackled ominously between the hammering beats of your heart?

 

Sweeney was spared having to answer any of your questions, and you were spared any further apocalyptic thoughts, by the sudden burst of the bathroom door opening, kicked wide by a short angry looking woman with an unlit cigarette hanging lank and trodden between her dry lips and a deep furrow to her wrinkled brow. You both froze, heads swiveling to the aperture as her gaze flicked from you up to Sweeney; down then back up again.

 

“Who the fuck are you?” The woman asked, apparent utter apathy banked in her cool tone, something strangely pallid to her jaundiced skin, as though the veins beneath her tacky flesh were dry and bloodless. You blinked at her once, twice, your mouth falling open as you swept your gaze in macabre curiosity down her form.

 

She carried herself like a girl who had always been pretty, who was used to a certain level of comfort because of it, and who had just recently realized that she might not be as _fair_ as she once was.

 

It was the bitter dispossession marring her pale brow and the output downturn of her full lips that tipped you off. And it made sense, judging by the thick, gnarled surgical sutures clawing up the cuff of her skeletal shoulder and the deep purple bag’s lying heavy and cloying under her eyes, present due to a very distinct kind of tired. A kind of tired that sleep would do nothing to cure.

 

Those things, and the annoyed, knowing glint that had entered Sweeney’s gaze upon seeing her, wordlessly told you that this girl was in fact the person Sweeney had referred to during your last sordid meeting, the ‘night of the living dead in live putrid action’. You gazed unabashedly at her, tipping your head as you met her gaze unflinchingly once more.

 

“Not that I really care,” the dead girl continued, lighting her cigarette despite the clearly displayed _no smoking_ signs heralded around the bathroom, her rebellion borne more out of general disdain than any hot headed hatred for management, “But anyone stupid enough to get that close to Ginger Minge is worth an introduction, I guess.” She gestured with the flick of her smoldering pillar of tobacco to the embrace that you and Sweeney were still half engaged in, one of his huge hands curled possessively around your hip, one of your palms resting on the brawny slip of his chest. While you slid your fingers from his form at her callous, accusing glance, Sweeney was making no moves to take his hand from your hip, and briefly you entertained a slim thread of fluttering warmth at the comforting implications of that stubborn resignation.

 

“I’m the girl who needs answers,” you supplied after a heartbeat. You would have told her your name, but as she’d said, as you could blatantly tell, she didn’t really care, “And protection,” you added, stepping incrementally back into the huge wall of Sweeney’s chest, a rich plume of warmth blooming in your stomach at the possessive twitching of his fingers about your hip bones, “I’m sick of beings, gods I guess, fucking with me. I just want to tell them to go screw themselves to their ugly faces. And you’re the best lead I’ve got for that.”

 

Dead Girl regarded you with eyes that were brimming with shattering stoicism, icy, pallid apathy, but there beneath the roiling lassitude of her gaze you thought you saw something heated spark for just a moment, something like memory, like _feeling_. And then it was gone, and she raised that cigarette to her papery lips once more, the only fire remaining in her gaze the one reflected on the dull surface of her irises.

 

“We’re headed to Kentucky,” Dead Girl replied after a careful appraising glance to the duffel tucked surreptitiously beneath the sink and a meaningful acknowledging look aimed at the leprechaun behind you, “We’re going to see a murder of gods,” she supplied, and somehow you suspected that a double entendre lay coiled thick and gnarled beneath her words, blazoned with bitter intention, “And you can’t get any better protection than what’s standing in this room.” The sardonic thumb she had pointed at her still chest left little room for conjecture about who she was referring to, and despite the heavy bite of her arrogance, you felt a strange almost charmed smile flit about your lips in response.

 

“So, Ginger Minge’s Girlfriend,” Dead Girl quipped, tossing you an impatient glance as she took another drag from her cigarette, smoke billowing untouched from her dry lips, “You in or what?”

 

Sweeney had just moved to speak, to protest no doubt, but Dead Girl silenced him with a searing look and the slashing raise of one slim brow that left no room for protest and to your utter amazement Sweeney actually shut up, clamping his brash mouth into a thin angry line. _Damn_ , you really had to learn how to do that.

 

You had no idea what was waiting for you in Kentucky, no idea of what you were getting yourself into, but this strange alliance felt right somehow, felt _safe_. Better the devil you know, and all that. At least, that’s what you told yourself as you tore your eyes from the unmistakable ‘Y’ incision peeking out from beneath the collar of Dead Girl’s shirt, met her eyes without hesitation and replied.

 

“Yeah,” you could practically feel Sweeney’s anxious curse slide like a blade down your spine, and you made a mental note to grill him about it later, focusing all your attention on the dead girl in front of you and the pallid, pleased gleam flashing in her listless eyes, “I’m in.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello Lovely Readers!
> 
> OMG I am SO excited for you all to read this chapter! We get to sink our teeth into some real, gritty Laura Moon/Sweeney/Reader action, and let me tell you, that girl is so much fun to write! I know that Salim isn't as present in this chapter, but I promise I'll flesh him out a bit more as I continue to write! 
> 
> SO how did I do?? This was my first attempt at Laura Moon - was she in character? Was she enough of an asshole? Was she not enough of an asshole? PLEASE tell me your thoughts, because I might have a Laura POV section planned at the start of the next chapter (which I'll scrap if I'm terrible at writing her lol) and I need your thoughts! xD 
> 
> Also, because you all are so amazing I have a million fresh ideas, and I couldn't have gotten them without you, so THANK YOU! You all are the best readers a budding writer could ask for! As for length of the fic, at least this first part, let's say about 10/11 chapters as of right now, depending on the length of the next few that I have planned, and ooooh boy, you all are going to LOVE what I have planned!
> 
> ALSO, I have a small headcanon that Laura follows Sweeney when he's peeing in the woods not just because she doesn't care about his comfort or privacy, but because he's been known to take long bathroom breaks, which we will most definitely be exploring in later chapters ;) 
> 
> ALSO ALSO - I'm sorry for this chapter being a little late, I usually try to update within a week, but you know, life happened. I'll try to post the next chapter soon, which shouldn't be too hard because I have the next few actually planned out. Key word = "should" lol
> 
> As always, I sincerely hope you enjoyed, thank you for your fantastic support!
> 
> Mood Board for this Chapter!
> 
> http://imagines-oneshots-blog.tumblr.com/post/163719355469/all-that-glitters-chapter-7-vodka-black-coffee
> 
> EDIT:  
> I'm sorry about that random patch of italicized text near the bottom of this chapter, sometimes converting the chapters into "Rich Text" does weird things to them, but it's been fixed! Thanks for bearing with me!


	8. Vol VIII

Chapter Eight: Hay Bales, Pit Stops and Far Too Much Quality Time

 

Laura was annoyed.

 

Or at least she would have been if she could actually fucking feel anything. It sat like a stone in her gut, this yawning absence of emotion that had the distinct potential to border on annoyance, that lay tinged with just the barest imperceptible hint of sentiment, and it _hurt_. It was sharp as the edge of a razor, but dulled as though slipping callous and gnarled against cold skin. And surrounding it all, keen and biting and oh so familiar, was the slightest intangible quaver of malcontent.

 

She sighed as she lit another cigarette, though in truth the huffing action was borne more out of habit than actual necessity due to her distinct lack of respirations, and poignantly, purposefully, she ignored the nervous glance that Salim-not-Salim cast her way as she took a hearty drag. Out of something that was almost, but not quite, consideration she rolled the window down another inch and puffed out her barely inhaled smoke in the general direction of the budding corn fields rolling by.

 

Laura was annoyed that she couldn’t really feel annoyed, that it teased her senses with almost touches and stolen glances, lilting about the very edges of her mind until she was sure she would go insane with the desire to _actually fucking feel annoyed_. She was annoyed that the yawning chasm in her chest was widening, cracking open with each damning moment that passed in utter stillness, with each breath that she didn’t take, didn’t need. She was annoyed that she kept replaying that kiss with Shadow in her head, grasping with desperate hands at the brief moment of _alive_ that had skittered like pure stannic sunlight through her dry shriveled veins when her lips had met his, that she kept wondering acridly if Ginger Minge was right, if Shadow had really tasted death on her tongue that night and realized once and for all that his wife was dead. Shit, even _she_ tasted death dancing on her tongue when she moved it just so against the roof of her mouth - or maybe that was from the cheap cigarettes that lay in their crumpled carton in her lap. To be honest, she couldn’t really tell the difference anymore.

 

But mostly, due to the inescapable proximity of this rancid stinking cab, Laura was fucking annoyed that every time she glanced in the rear view mirror situated to the left above her head she saw you and Sweeney curled up in the back seat, some part of your bodies always touching. A shoulder here, an elbow there, if you got sleepy maybe a leg draped over his waiting lap. And Jesus fuck, did you have to smile so fucking much? Even now you were grinning so wide that it should be fucking illegal as Sweeney taught you some lame coin trick, his big blustering fingers slipping deftly over yours as he slid a scuffed gold piece between your digits, his eyes rapt on your features as you giggled with delight. Laura could barely make out his words behind the thick Plexiglas separating the front and back seats, but from what she could hear they were softer, gentler than any he’d ever spoken to her. The distinct lack of expected ache she didn’t feel roiling in her chest abruptly sent her careening down another winding sweep of almost annoyance.

 

“The trick is that the coin has to be warm,” Sweeney was crooning to you as a smile that Laura could very nearly have interpreted as _doting_ slid like a knife against his bearded cheekbones “Or else it won’t stick to the skin.”

 

“Warm like this?” You questioned, cupping your hands around his and blowing warm air onto his skin, making something in his eyes spark as they gazed at you, and suddenly Laura felt a strange shifting in her belly, as though someone had plunged a blade into her stomach and was twisting.

 

“Exactly, _mo Éinín,”_ Sweeney rumbled, and for just a moment Laura was sure she would throw up in her mouth, “And once it’s warm you can just-” Sweeney trailed off as he tucked the coin into your sleeve, sticking the metal against the balmy flesh of your wrist so that when he lifted his fingers the coin had all but disappeared. You cooed in delight, nearly bouncing in your seat as you sung his praises, glanced at him with blatant wonder in your gaze and a warm smile brimming on your lips. When Laura rolled her eyes so hard she was sure they would pop straight out of her head she caught sight of Salim watching the pair of you from the driver’s seat, though his expression was notably warmer than hers, tinged with something like understanding, like appreciation, and in a blinding flash Laura realized that he must have felt the same way with his man, his Jinn.

 

Despite the heated breeze shuffling in through the numerous cracked windows, carrying in the dying light of the setting sun and the gentle scent of freshly plowed earth, feeling very much alone despite the car full of people, Laura felt a sudden frisson of ice crackle down her spine, a chilling tumble of sleet that seemed to seep into her cracking bones, to spill into her corroding flesh, and right then she knew deep down near her still heart, past her almost annoyance and grating impatience, that it was because she was jealous. Because even during their best days, the days long before prison and Robbie and secrets as dark as a raven’s wing, she and Shadow had never once looked at each other the way Sweeney looked at you, the way you looked right back up at him.

 

The way that had love hiding in its corners, flashing in your crinkled eyes, the helpless upturn of your lips, the playful tangle of your fingers. And even though her heart was as cold as ice, as still as a winter’s morning, for just one thrumming moment Laura wanted to feel that too, to have someone look at her with such devotion. And deeper still, somewhere closer to the stolen coin that in truth didn’t belong to her, the one sitting hot and ancient in the crumbling ruin of her ribs, she knew she didn’t deserve it.

* * *

 

“Why the fuck are we stopping?”

 

Sweeney demanded as he unfolded his oversized body from the cramped back seat and stepped out onto the sweltering asphalt, his voice imbued with that customary boom and bluster that you knew so well, and though it made you roll your eyes in stark second hand embarrassment it also had a thick shard of warmth blooming in your chest, borne out of something closer to fondness than chagrin. He followed Salim around the back of the car, sweeping his hands high above his head in a spine lengthening stretch as he strode around the vehicle, and honestly you didn’t really try to stop your eyes from fixing where they wanted to, on the tantalizing slip of skin exposed between the waist of his pants and the lifted hem of his shirt, your tongue dipping out to dab at your bottom lip as you spied that glimmering garnet trail of wiry hair running from his navel down lower, to parts you were sorely missing these days due to the close proximity of your traveling companions. Sweeney didn’t miss the direction of your gaze, and the wry answering upturn of his knowing smile had a molten knot of lusty want shifting low in your belly in reply.

 

“ _Maghrib_. I must pray.” Salim supplied in brief answer, shooting a wary glance at the encroaching flame haired giant behind him before hastily grabbing his prayer mat from the creaking trunk of the car and crossing the abandoned road to apparent safety. Laura followed suit, settling in her customary place a few paces away from Salim, curious as she seemed to be about his daily worship rituals, tenth cigarette of the day hanging lank between her lips as her cloudy eyes settled on his kneeling form. A fly landed on her shoulder, skittering across the surgical sutures winding up the small cuff of her bony shoulder, but she didn’t seem to notice, or if she did she paid the insect no mind. Sweeney sighed as he settled in and leaned precariously against the rear bumper of the car, which looked distinctly as if it had seen better, perkier days.

 

“ _Feisigh leat_ ,” Sweeney murmured as he plucked a slim hand rolled cigarette from somewhere in the depths of his jacket pocket and began to light it, pulling from the smoldering pile of tobacco slowly, savoring the heated slip of its smoke from between his lips. It did interesting things to his mouth, that smoke, things that had you dying to close the scant distance between your lips and his, to sample that tantalizing vapor for yourself, find out if it tasted like summer berries and brimy coastlines, as you heartily suspected.

  
“I’ve heard you say that before,” you began as you strode a wide path around his outstretched legs, your body just out of the reach of his seeking hands, “What does it mean?”

 

“Nothing nice,” Sweeney answered, trying and failing to a lay a hungry hand on the sloping curve of your hips, which at the moment were tightly encased in a sturdy pair of leggings that did wonders for your admittedly pert ass. Upon seeing the seriousness banked in your gaze, quavering about your brow, Sweeney leaned back a measure to regard you, sage and sunshine eyes tripping hastily over your features, as if gauging your seriousness, a brief peal of delight flashing there as he saw you were indeed intent on this task. “You truly want to know?”

 

“Yeah, I’ve never spoken another language before,” you supplied with a lazy shrug of one shoulder, the action doing nothing to allay the genuine intrigue thrumming in your chest, sparking in your smile, “And I’m curious. I suspect you’re saying some very naughty things.”

 

“Naughty indeed,” Sweeney husked, the smile that curved his smirking lips meeting his eyes with gusto as he replied, shifted to offer you his cigarette, which you took with appreciative fingers.

 

“For starters, that nickname you always call me, _mo Éinín_ _,”_ you supplied, the foreign words clumsy and unpracticed on your tongue, but somehow right as they settled there, calling to mind his huge hands settling hot and wanting on your sweat slicked skin, his molten tongue licking a trail of fire up the cords of your neck, his low voice whispering those syllables, ragged and broken, against your quivering flesh, “It means little bird?”

 

“Aye,” Sweeney replied, his eyes tripping on the lines of your lips as you took a long drag from the cigarette balanced between your pointer and middle fingers, something hot and virile and wanting playing in his gaze, “A fitting name, I think, for such an elusive female.” You flushed hotly at his praise, heat flooding your cheekbones at the intensity of his gaze, the fervor of his tone. Not being able to touch each other was beginning to take a toll on the both of you, to weigh heavily on your burgeoning desires, and you weren’t entirely sure how much longer you could stand to be this close to him and not be able to really touch him, really feel him. “And that, there between your fingers, is a _toitín,”_

_“Toitín_ _,”_ you parroted back, glancing up at him for affirmation and finding it sparking at the corners of his eyes, quirking his lips into a warm grin.

 

“Good, lassling, you have a way with the old tongue,” Sweeney said, trying again to land an ambitious hand upon the lush swell of your waist. You slipped from his grasp just in time, flashing him the upturn of a teasing smile for his trouble.

 

“Teach me more,” you pleaded gently, your grin just warm enough to convince him to not stop trying to touch you, and something in your chest pulsed wildly at his answering smirk.

 

 _“CliúsaÍ,”_ Sweeney husked, voice low and wanting, eyes dark, predatory, belaying the barely fettered control teetering beneath his skin, lashing across his muscles, flashing in the bite of his bared teeth.

 

“And what does that mean?”

 

“Cocktease,” Sweeney supplied, looking almost proud as he gazed down at you from beneath the perch of his crooked nose, the nose you’d seen him set with his own bloody fingers, and you were sure your stomach would have turned at the poignant memory if not for the handsome clench of his bearded jaw, that glimmer of mischief sparking behind his gaze. You knew what followed that particular brand of devilry, but at the moment you couldn’t quite muster up the appropriate responding amount of apprehension.

_“CliúsaÍ._ Good word to know,” you answered with a wink, flipping your travel ragged hair over your shoulder as you smiled at him, loving the want in his gaze, the appreciative fervor in his eyes as he looked at you, “Another?” Sweeney paused then, seeming to think, to select his next word carefully.

_  
“Éireann,”_ there was a certain glimmering thread of reverence banked in his tone as he spoke, a careful, solemn appreciation that had you stilling, tensing with anticipation.

 

“What does that mean?” You asked, though you heartily suspected that you already knew.

 

“Ireland,” Sweeney answered, affirming your hunch, and as he spoke the golden rays of the setting sun fell on him, illuminating his fiery red hair, making it spark like fire, churn like burnished copper. As he gazed at you, you caught sight of the emerald glinting in his gaze and immediately images of supple verdant hills rolling hard and fast down meadowed plains sprung up like weeds in your mind, scenes that tasted like sunshine on your tongue and warmed the very edges of your soul with the sheer unfettered strength of the joy thrumming through them. You welcomed their presence, knew by now that they were a side effect of his power. “Say it, little bird.”

_“Éireann_ _,”_ you whispered, felt a crackle of energy shiver down your spine as the syllables slipped from your lips, lips that Sweeney’s gaze was rapt on, and he groaned as you spoke, his hands finally finding their way onto the swell of your hips, wide palms pulling you roughly into him.

 

“Fucking hell, I like hearing these words fall from your bonny lips,” Sweeney rasped, the jagged edge in his voice a poignant reminder of just how long it had been since you’d felt his power spark against your skin, felt his hands moving hot and heavy on you, “Say my name, lassling. Say it the way only you can, like I’m your god and you’re my votary.”

 

“Here?” you asked, apprehension laying thick in your inquiry despite the fact that the naked need in his tone sparked an answering flame of arousal deep within you, had you falling all too easily into his arms.

 

“Aye, here little bird,” Sweeney crooned, his fingers splaying about your ass, his rough touch grinding the slip of your hips hard into his, “Now.”

 

 _“Buile Shuibhne_ _,”_ you rasped, ghosting your lips along the taught lines of his chest, across the hollow of his throat. Sweeney growled so low you could barely hear him, but you felt the rumble of that wanton vibration right down to your curling toes, shivered as it played low in your belly.

 

“Fuck, lassling, keep talking like that,” Sweeney rumbled against your temple, his lips as scorching as a brand as they pressed to your flesh, rasped over your cheekbones, “Agus _Tá mé ag dul a lúbadh tú os cionn sin bailíodh fear_.”

You smirked against the pound of his pulse, flicked your tongue across the smooth skin there, loving the way the sinew beneath your mouth jumped, as if he had just swallowed hard. “And that means?”

 

“And I’m going to bend you over that hay bale,” Sweeney rasped, gesturing with his russet bearded chin towards the numerous golden hued bale’s scattered along the mossy plains situated on either side of the abandoned road, each one jutting like a sunlit island amidst a sea of churning green.

 

“I’d like to see you try,” you scoffed, nipping none so gently at the juncture of his shoulder, teeth pressing hot and urgent into his skin, and Sweeney cursed low as he palmed your ass, ground your undulating hips harder against his.

 

“ _Ná thástáil dom, ceann beag_ ,” Sweeney husked, slapping a scopic palm against the waiting flesh of your backside, rutting his hips hard into yours, thoroughly relaying the direction he intended to steer this already molten conversation in. Knowing your flame haired leprechaun, and just how testy he got without his worship, you wouldn’t put it past him to take you right here on the hood of this shitty cab with no regard for who might be watching. And right now, you weren’t entirely sure you had the strength or will to stop him.

 

“Jesus Christ you two, get a fucking room,” Dead Wife’s intruding voice cut through the arousal soaked air like a whip, scattering your wanton abandon as thoroughly as though you’d just been caught by an ireful parent with a boyfriend’s hand up your skirt. You were somehow sure that the sensation was uncomfortably similar when Dead Wife threw you a disdainful glare and slid back into her customary perch in the front seat at the same time as Salim, both of them waiting with varying degrees of patience for you to disentangle yourself from Sweeney’s waiting arms.

 

“I guess the hay bale will have to wait,” you sighed, slipping from Sweeney’s grasp even as the lust within you grew, the flames of your desire somehow fanned by the poignant interruption, fostered by the discontent your companions showed your lascivious displays of affection.

 

Sweeney seemed to agree with you, because even as he climbed into the backseat next to you he laid a brash hand on your thigh, thumb stroking the warm flesh of your leg, searing through the thin material of your leggings, rippling down to your very marrow, igniting an unruly spark of want deep within your belly.

 

“Not too long,” Sweeney cooed in your ear, pulling your leg onto his lap, slipping his fingers tighter about your thigh, belaying your shared impatience, “Those bales are beginning to look quite appealing.”

 

You groaned, canting your head towards his hot mouth, acquiescing to his molten want, musing that, _yes, yes they really are_ ….

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello Lovely Readers!
> 
> Here is a brand new chapter for your (hopeful) enjoyment! I know that it took me a little longer this time, and I sincerely apologize for the wait, but I do hope that the softer, gentler moments of slow burn and fluff were worth it! I had some issues with focus in this chapter, so in the end I went with a theme of connection - a lack of it (seen through Laura) and an abundance of it (seen through Sweeney and the reader). Was that clear, or did I miss my mark here?? Quick shout out to  
> Lady Ravanna for providing the wonderful inspiration for the Gaelic lessons in this fic! Thank you for your amazing feedback!
> 
> Please do let me know if you enjoyed, if you have any other ideas that you'd like to see appear in this fic, if you just wanna scream and happy dance over how cute Sweeney is with me, all forms of expression are welcome here! I look forward to your comments! Until next time! (It will be sooner, I promise!)
> 
> P.S. This was a super heavy Gaelic chapter (what were your thoughts on that btw??) so I thought I'd translate the Gaelic that Sweeney says at the end of the chapter - Ná thástáil dom, ceann beag. It means "do not test me, small one"..How cute!
> 
> P.P.S. I'm thinking of having the format of the next chapter be a series of brief but explicit scenes following Sweeney and the reader's various interactions while we go through the daily cycle of Salim's prayers. I can neither confirm nor deny that there will be smut...Any thoughts on this??  
> Mood Board:http://imagines-oneshots-blog.tumblr.com/post/164244486499/all-that-glitters-chapter-8-hay-bales-pit-stops


	9. Vol IX

Chapter Nine: Crooked Grins, Sly Hands and a Blessedly Shitty Motel Room

 

_Fajr – 5:44 am_

 

 

You were woken from the fragile embrace of peaceful slumber by the jarring sound of a creaky car door slamming shut, followed soon after by its twin being snapped carelessly closed on the opposite side of the vehicle. You cracked an eye open with reluctant wakefulness playing acerbically about your brow, shifting lazily against the solid wall of muscle at your back, noting with a hearty measure of chagrin that it was so early the sun had yet to fully rise. This meant that it was unacceptable for you to be conscious, so you huffed hard and wiggled your hips more fully into the sizeable body wedged against the vinyl behind you.

 

This unintentionally heated movement of your backside had the scopic hand of that hulking body’s owner coming to rest heavily on the swell of your hip, which was currently clothed in stretchy cotton leggings and draped with a coarse slip of oversized jean jacket. Despite the slumber tinged weariness tripping thick and cloying against your temples, you felt the heat of that sizeable hand sear straight down to your skin, and you shivered as a wicked thrill of _awake_ sizzled like fire up your spine in response.

 

“Sweeney,” you groaned as the thumb of his hand began to stroke in the dip of the hipbone curling closest to him, his wanton teasing actions hidden beneath the cover of that ragged jean jacket, his grin that you felt curving against your hair rending a smile on your weary lips despite the sleep still swirling thickly behind your eyelids. Your voice wasn’t really an order to stop, the gentle rocking of your hips into his wanting touch and the soft responding throb that had begun between your legs would have laid that lie bare right down to its very marrow, but it was definitely a reminder much stronger than your brittle willpower that there was company hovering somewhere across the dim road, out of earshot but certainly not out of sight.

 

“Shh,” he crooned in reply, his voice a wicked imploration huffed hot and tempting against the shell of your ear as he curled himself more fully around your form, making you feel tiny where you were curved into him, the little spoon to his much, much bigger one, “Go back to sleep, _mo_ _Éin_ _í_ _n_.”

 

“How am I supposed to do that with all your…distractions?” you shot back at him with about as much bluster as a sleepy kitten just as his fingers dipped into the waist band of your leggings, his touch sure and unabashed despite you blatantly calling out his knowingly teasing actions.

 

“Here, my little bird,” Sweeney husked, his voice ravaged by sleep and cigarettes and something much more molten, “Let me help you, now.”

 

You sighed deeply as his long lithe fingers slipped beneath the lace of your panties and found the wet aching flesh of your cunt, your legs spreading as much as your tightly fit position would allow despite your previous admonishments. It was almost embarrassing, how slick that flesh between your thighs had become just from the slide of his deft fingers against your skin and the rasp of his hot breath at your ear. The lust shimmering between the two of you was so thick it was nearly palpable, thrumming and tangible in the air as you traveled down these God forsaken backroads and highways that all looked the same, that all had those telltale hints of modern civilization vanishing in the wake of corn fields and rolling hills stretching as far as the eye could see. You supposed that this was the kind of landscape that Sweeney had been born and bred in, the kind in which his people, The Fair Folk, had flourished, and just for that fact alone you tried for some far flung appreciation of it. Though for all your efforts, you were sure that you would have been more successful if you could travel these roads _alone_ with Sweeney, free to stop where you would to talk and eat and, inevitably, fuck. But such as it was you were crammed together into the backseat of a shitty cab that smelled slightly like a well-used toilet, curled up in the back seat, lying on your sides, your back to his front, with his hand down your panties and his gentle praises huffing in your ear.

 

  
And, despite your grumblings, it truly was all manner of hot.

 

“So slick for me, lassling,” Sweeney grated, his teeth nipping hard at your nape, his fingers swirling expertly against the wetness throbbing in your cunt, playing at the tight bud of your clit in that familiar way that he knew would drive you wild, “You’ll have to hurry if you want to cum, little bird. These morning prayers of Ibrahim-Bin Whatever the Fuck don’t usually last long.”

 

“Neither will I if you just shut up and touch me,” you threw back to him, your breaths gusting hard against the sticky vinyl pressed beneath your cheek, the barest hint of a saucy smile playing about your lips despite the moans sticking to your tongue, threatening to break from behind the cage of your gritted teeth.

 

“Oh, will you now, little lassling?” Sweeney replied casually as he slid his thick fingers against the throb of your clit at a pace that was anything but nonchalant, and although you couldn’t see all of his face, could only see the grinning curve of one bearded cheekbone and the devilish twinkle of a green eye, you could practically _feel_ the sardonic raise of his russet brow, the knowing quirk of his infuriatingly tempting mouth, “Because I’d like to think that by now I’ve become very well acquainted with this sweet little cunt of yours, and I know when it’s tensing to cum. And now, lassling is not one of those times,” Sweeney nipped lovingly at the taut cords of your neck, bent as it was against him, a flexed extension of the desperate bow of your back, the urgent press of your hips into his expert touch as he slipped a thick finger into your tight heat, flicking the bud of your clit with an expert thumb, “Not yet, anyway.”

 

“Sweeney,” you crooned, grinding your ass back into the cradle of his thighs imploringly, canting your head desperately against his shoulder, revealing the lithe slip of your collarbones for his hungry mouth, “Please-” Any further words were stolen by the desire dancing on your lips, slipping a vice grip around your slim throat.

 

“You had better hurry, little bird,” Sweeney chuckled as he pressed his mouth against the juncture of your shoulder, that thick finger he had wedged deep within your pussy moving so fast you could barely keep up with the wet, aching slide of it, the slip of his thumb against your clit searing, brutal and perfect, “They’ll be done any minute now.”

 

You felt that urgency searing in your veins, pounding in tandem with the abiding ache deep in your cunt, and despite how badly you wanted it, how much your throbbing body longed for it, you needed _more_. You knew then that you couldn’t cum without something else; the hefty press of another finger perhaps, the sight of his bearded cheekbones and crooked nose smirking down at you, the naked slip of his flesh against your heated skin. Whatever it was, it had your heart sinking like a stone in your chest as you heard those highly unwelcome voices nearing the vehicle, the telling light of dawn spilling golden and resplendent into the dingy cab, illuminating all manner of things hidden by the dusk.

 

You heard Sweeney mutter a curse against your temple, felt him grace your throbbing clit with one last longing sweep of his thumb before he carefully but hastily removed his fingers from your sex, reluctant as the motion was, and slipped his hand out of your panties, though he left the appendage close, curling those digits low on your waist, in that space between the dips of your hipbones.

 

“I know, _mo_ _Éin_ _í_ _n_ , Soon, love.” Sweeney rasped, adjusting his jean jacket that was draped over your twined forms and tucking you further into his body just as the doors to the car opened and your two companions slid into their seats, chatting happily about whether or not God was actually listening to your prayers. When the car started rolling once more, jarring your battered body with each asphalt wrought imperfection its revving wheels slid over, rattling that urgent kernel of lust that sat low in your belly with each bump of the wheels, you knew that He was not.

 

 

_Zuhr – 12:01 pm_

 

 

“All I’m asking is how do you know that your god is listening?”

 

Laura had been at this for about an hour now, following the long abandoned threads of her and Salim’s conversation much earlier in the day, pressing her companion for an answer markedly more tangible than the admittedly nebulous one’s he had been giving her. Intrigued, sure by now that she didn’t sleep, like, _at all_ since her miraculous posthumous appearance rotting back on the earth instead of inside it, you followed Laura as she trailed after Salim, intent on anything that wasn’t huge, thickly muscled and ginger that could potentially re-ignite that unruly flame of lust you had just recently managed to tamp down.

 

“I know my God is listening because I hear him speak to me,” Salim supplied, his voice immeasurably patient, as if he were explaining to a grumpy child, as he spread out his prayer mat with careful reverence, the kind that reminded you poignantly of Sweeney slipping his hands down between your breasts, fanning his fingers in between the dips of your ribcage, whispering heatedly about your beauty as he laid you out before him. _So much for a distraction…._

 

“Okaaay,” Laura prodded in a sing song voice, crossing her skinny, denim encased legs onto the gravel strewn road beneath her and slipping a lank cigarette between her papery white lips as she continued, “And what do you hear him say?”

 

Salim-not-Salim seemed to consider this carefully for a moment, his glittering black eyes sharp as they peered at the sun high in its zenith atop the sky, a bright sheen to the dappled fuzz of the almost beard scrubbing his cheeks.

 

“It is not always words,” Salim supplied, half turning back to Laura where he was standing, facing some invisible line that you guessed to be the direction of Mecca, though all that currently stood in front of him was a wide slip of emerald wind-blown grass and a pitifully dilapidated, long abandoned farm house that looked as though it used to be a proud red, “Sometimes it is a feeling, a warmth in my chest. A sense of rightness, I suppose.” Salim glanced at Laura, then to you, and as you met his eyes, glimmering in the strong noon sunlight like two bright chips of obsidian, you quirked a gentle smile his way, which to your delight he returned, and something like empathy passed between you then, a tremulous, fragile understanding that felt like fire as it slid down your spine, burrowed in your veins. And then Salim shook himself and turned back around, facing towards his imagined monument. “It is hard to explain.”

 

 _Indeed it was_ , you mused as you watched Salim begin his prayers, raising his hands above his head with whispered venerations lingering on his dry lips. You knew that feeling he described, that heady, innate rightness that he spoke of. You remembered how it sparked against your skin, slid beneath muscle and sinew to burrow into some place deeper than you’d ever reached before, somewhere near your soul, perhaps. You chanced a glance over your shoulder back at Sweeney, who was emerging from a hasty bathroom trip to the woods and glaring darkly at the trees behind him, no doubt muttering curses towards the ravens that flitted in the arbor’s foliate depths. At that moment he looked every bit as mad as his name suggested, and deep in your breast, near your hammering heart, you knew that you cared for him despite it, maybe even _because_ of it.

 

Abruptly, being here with Salim as he prayed made you feel unbearably nosy, as though you were watching something poignantly _intimate_ unfold, a private conversation between a God and his loving servant that only the two should witness, so you turned away, leaving Salim to his far-away God and the prostration that He required. You had a deity of your own, right here.

 

And you knew you’d enjoy his worship much, much more.

 

 

_Asr – 3:52 pm_

 

“I get it, you know,” you said to Salim once he’d finished his afternoon prayers and had begun to roll up his mat, the care and devotion that he took with the simple slip of canvas never failing to astound you. You made sure to approach him once the main portion of his praise was over this time, and once Dead Wife had meandered away, because even though you couldn’t explain why, you didn’t want her to hear what you had to say to Salim now, “That feeling you were talking about earlier. Is that the reason you’re trying to find your Jinn? You want more of it?” Salim looked almost guilty as he glanced at you, though you were heartily sure that he’d committed no crime. If prayer to a deity was a punishable offense now, you were sure as shit guilty too.

 

“If you know that feeling, then you also know it is not easily given up,” Salim replied, rising and tucking his mat under his arm as he began to walk with you back to the car. You sighed as you thought of all the times you’d said to yourself that you wouldn’t see Sweeney again, that it was for the best if you stayed away from him, only to find yourself back in his arms within weeks, days, or even hours of your proud proclamations, mewling like a cat in heat with his lips on yours, his muscles roiling thick and brawny beneath your seeking fingers and his low groans molten as sin on your tongue.

 

“No, it is not,” you replied, flashing him a small smile of commiseration as you crossed the street back to the car, and the two impatient companions waiting within it, “You know, everyone keeps telling me to be careful, that I could get hurt, but what’s the point of life if you don’t take risks, if you don’t gamble every now and again. Yeah, you could be burned, but at least you played one hell of a game, right?”

 

“A month ago I wasn’t even in the game, let alone playing it. Really, I’m just happy to have a purpose.”

 

_Devotion. Recompense. Purpose. There’s always been a god-shaped hole in man’s head…_

The quote popped unbidden into your mind, and although for the life of you, you couldn’t remember where you’d heard it you knew it was right. You eased open the trunk for Salim to place his prayer mat inside, and as he did you found your curiosity rising, spilling over onto your lips, making a question fall from between them before you could stop it.

 

“And when you find your Jinn, what then?”

 

Salim rose to his full height then, and even though it wasn’t imposing or even threatening, it had the effect of making him seem determined, _righteous_ , and for some reason it made you smile.

 

  
“We shall know each other once more, He and I,” you would have had to be blind to miss the blatant excitement glinting in Salim-not-Salim’s obsidian eyes, sparking like starlight against the inky onyx of his irises, brimming from his lashes to flit down to his cheekbones, to upturn the corners of his mouth into a grin. You understood that excitement, felt it rush through your chest every time you caught a glimpse of that familiar garnet spun copper hair peeking between the peeling yellow paint of the trunk, fire against a sea of oily leather, “And we shall be happy.”

 

Salim-not-Salim was still smiling as he shut the trunk and climbed into the driver’s seat, something warm and traitorously familiar battering against your ribs at the grin Sweeney tossed your way as you slid into your pleather perch and scooted close to him, needing the hulking warmth of his oversized form, the surety banked in his huge hands, the anchor that his heaving chest provided. Because, despite the smile that flitted about your lips at Salim’s hope, at his contagious sense of goodness, you just couldn’t get those foreign words out of your head as they echoed in your mind like the crack of a whip against prostrate flesh, like the lashing bite of a sword slicing through a sacrificial lamb.

 

_There’s always been a god-shaped hole in man’s head…_

 

 

_Maghrib – 7:43 pm_

 

 

“Come on, lassling, we only have a few minutes,” Sweeney grated, voice low and hot at your ear as he slipped his hands into the dips of your waist, which lay tantalizingly exposed as you wound your travel weary, arousal soaked body into a bone creaking stretch, “But I can be fast.”

 

It took you the space of a heartbeat to decide to allow him to maneuver you towards the sparse wood sprawling behind the parked car and even less time to break out into an anticipation fueled run beside him. You giggled as Sweeney pressed you urgently against a tree tucked carefully out of the line of site of the car, though immediately your chitters were silenced by the hot slip of his lips against yours, nearly as molten and insistent as his hands that were busy skating beneath the hem of your t shirt to skim heavy and demanding up the notches of your bowing spine.

 

“I fuckin’ need you, little bird,” Sweeney rasped against your lips, voice ragged and broken from the hefty weight of lusts gone long unsated, of wants left to ripen and flourish beneath the strains of frustration, “I haven’t felt your bonny breasts in far too long,” he husked as he ripped aside the thin material of your bra to cup your aching breasts in his huge hands, calloused palms deliciously rough against your sensitive flesh. You moaned against his lips as he began to knead your pliant breasts, mewling as a rush of arousal flooded between your thighs, pooling deep in your cunt. That ache from the morning was back with a vengeance, intent on not being ignored this time.

 

“Sweeney, I need, I-” your words were cut off by a low groan humming urgent and wanting from the back of your throat when Sweeney dipped one hand from your breast to grip your thigh, raising the limb so that it lay wrapped around his waist and slipping his hips against yours to create a friction that _had_ to be divinely inspired. It was just too _good_ as it shot down your spine, throbbed hot and insistent in your cunt, swept to your curling toes.

 

“What do you need, _mo_ _Éin_ _í_ _n_ ,” Sweeney rasped as he bent his russet head to nip at the taut cords of your neck, exposed when you’d thrown back your head to moan loudly at the delicious friction sparking from between your bodies. You felt the bite of his teeth like steel at your skin as he rent your hips against his, grinding against you as he slipped his hand tighter about your thigh, swept a thumb harder over your pebbling nipples, the movement of his hips as palpable as an earthquake, two tectonic plates setting to cause some sizeable ripples.

 

“Oh shit,” you groaned, your thighs beginning to shake from the perfect sliding rub of his hardness right where you needed it, taunting and perfect and just enough to make you come undone if he didn’t stop anytime soon, “I need to cum, Sweeney. Please, I _need_ it-”

 

You really did; you felt it heavy in your breasts, searing through your veins, pounding in your sex. It was all you could focus on, your naked, virile need and the clean, sweet sap of Sweeney’s skin beneath your tongue, a perfect echo of that first breeze of springtime or dawn’s light peeking from behind an ancient barrow to signal the new day.

 

“Then cum for me, little bird,” Sweeney husked as he plucked your nipple between his thumb and forefinger, the fingers he had curled around your ass biting deeper into the flesh there, rending you harder against him, “Let me see you cum for me, now.”

 

“Ginger Minge and his little Girlfriend, where the fuck are you?” Laura’s voice was an unwelcome whip as it rent the vibrant air between you, stale and deadened and biting as the crack of a bat, “Salim and I have been waiting for you for five minutes; if you’ve been fucking I swear I’m gonna tear your prick off and give it to those crows you keep yelling at.”

 

“Fuck,” Sweeney grated into your hair, his fingers pausing on your heated flesh as his hips stilled their driving press, his robust sentiment echoing right down to your hammering heart.

 

“I’m gonna fucking fight her if she keeps interrupting us,” you muttered as he reluctantly released your leg and pressed a gentle kiss to your temple before righting his pants to try to mask his obvious hard on, “I’ll do it, I promise.”

 

“Now that, I might like to see,” Sweeney replied, tucking a strand of your hair and tracing the line of your bottom lip with his thumb as he spoke, something gentle and soothing, yet strangely raving glinting in his eyes as he gazed at you, that unhinged wrath making a quaver of virile, potent lust erupt in your belly in response, much to your confusion. He didn’t say anything as he stomped out of the woods, his huge hand curled possessively around yours, his steps driving and determined.

 

“We need to keep moving,” Dead Wife said, and though she looked as though she had more to say, she wisely shut the fuck up when she caught sight of the dangerous gleam in Sweeney’s eyes.

 

  
“No, Dead Wife,” Sweeney replied, his voice booming against the trees standing sentry about the abandoned road, no one to witness his anger besides the waving wheat grass shifting lazily in the slight breeze and the fading light of the rapidly setting sun, “We need a fucking hotel and we need it now.”

 

Although there were about a dozen solid arguments that Sweeney could have made if Laura refused – _we’re not all undead zombies like you, look at Salim, he’ll pass out of exhaustion if we keep moving without a break_ – something else must have stopped her, because after a brief heartbeat of tense silence punctuated by the deafening pounding of your pulse in your ears and the weary huffs of Salim’s breaths, Laura assented, canting her head in a barely noticeable gesture of compliance.

 

“Stop at the first motel we see, Ibrahim bin Irem,” Sweeney ordered, flashing you a heartily pleased grin as he slid back into the car, that familiar bravado and bluster that you were stunningly eager to have roiling beneath your thighs soon playing about his brawny shoulders as he spoke, “First motel we see.”

 

 

_Isha – 10:54 pm_

 

 

In retrospect, you probably should have taken the time to disinfect the starchy sheets before jumping straight into them, but at this point you were far too gone to give even a single shit.

 

One of Sweeney’s brawny hands was winding steadily into the long hair trailing down your back, kissing your shoulder blades, and he was humming a low tone of approval as he smacked your bare ass, which was lifted up to him in offering where you were positioned on your hands and knees on the bed in front of him.

 

“Never seen a prettier sight,” Sweeney groaned as he slid a wide palm soothingly down the no doubt reddened flesh of your upturned ass, slipping his fingers eagerly between your thighs to dip a thumb into the wetness pooling in your exposed cunt, your panties long discarded on the outdated shag carpet waiting below the well-used bed you currently occupied. You moaned low as his seeking digit slipped through the aching throb of your sex, seeking the waiting nub of your clit while the hand he had twined in your hair tightened, pulling your body taut for him, forcing your back to bow and your neck to stretch further, “My little bird, all spread out for me.”

 

“Sweeney,” you choked out as you felt the huge wall of his chest slide over your back so that his hot mouth could nip at the exposed skin of your neck, the wire of his beard pulling at your flesh in that pleasant tingle that bordered just on the edge of painful, “Oh fuck, _please_.”

 

“What do you want, little bird?” Sweeney asked with a knowing tinge to his husky voice, the smile he curved against your nape pressing like a brand into your flesh, a mark of his possession of you.

 

“Fuck me,” you groaned, your voice taut from the cumbersome burdens of exhaustion and desire and unsated lust. You felt the bed shift as he straightened up and propped a knee onto the mattress besides yours, perceived the shifting of the air as he stroked his beautifully hard cock in preparation to give in to your heated demands.

 

“That’s what you want, lassling?” you could nearly feel the wicked heat of his thighs just barely brushing yours, shivered as he slid a finger down the notches of your spine, splayed his digits against the small of your back.

 

“Yes, Sweeney, please! Fuck me, let me worship you. I’m yours, your votary,” you panted as you rocked your hips tantalizingly, trying to tempt him into action, and judging by the low growl that erupted from him at the sight of your exposed sex and the ragged smack he delivered to your upturned ass, your devious plan worked.

 

“As I am yours, _mo_ _Éin_ _í_ _n_ ,” Sweeney husked, the head of his shaft slipping slow and gentle against your cunt for just a moment before he groaned and slammed his hard length inside of you, the welcome, blessed slide of his pounding erection finally seated deep within you making you mewl and writhe against him, rocking your hips urgently as you sought more friction, more of his perfect length, just _more_.

 

“Relax, my little bird,” Sweeney crooned as he lessened his grip on your hair somewhat to cant your head to the side, revealing one delicate ear for his hot, hungry mouth, “We have all night for our worship.”

 

You smiled as Sweeney nipped at the shell of your ear playfully and began to pistion his hips in earnest, wringing a series of careless urgent moans from your parted lips. You knew you were being loud, that you were most likely annoying the shit out of your companions bunked next door, but again, you couldn’t quite find the energy to give a damn. Besides, if you closed your eyes you thought you could just barely perceive the low hum of Salim chanting in the next room. You smiled, bouncing harder on Sweeney’s blessedly rigid shaft, loving the low growls he bit against your skin, the wanting patterns he traced into your hips with his fingers, realizing that while Salim worshipped his God this very minute, tonight you worshipped yours as well.

 

And you had been right – you were enjoying your prayers much, _much_ more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello Lovely Readers!
> 
> First and foremost - thank you SO MUCH for reading and sharing your thoughts with me, you all are amazing and I love you dearly! Secondly, I know that this chapter is formatted very differently from my usual chapters, so if you hated it, please tell me, or if you loved it (yay!) please tell me!! I tried to view this chapter from the lense of prayer and what that means for the members of our road trip. That means more Salim, yay! I loved writing him, was he in character though? In the show he's journeying between his old self and who he wants his new self to be with his Jinn, and that puts him in an interesting perspective, narrative wise. Thoughts here? 
> 
> How many Odin/Raven references did you catch in this chapter?? Prizes to the winner! (JK, all I have is my undying love and gratitude lol!) I love Mr. Wednesday too much not to throw him in there, plus a few other goodies and hints that careful readers might catch ;)
> 
> On an different note, how was the smut in this chapter?? Did I give you enough? Was there too much teasing and not enough down and dirty sex?? Please let me know! I'm really trying to find a way to work car sex into this fic (next chapter?), but bear with me while I plan out some cool things coming up. Again, thank you all for your support, you are AMAZING! Much love <3
> 
> Mood board!
> 
> http://imagines-oneshots-blog.tumblr.com/post/164511963889/all-that-glitters-chapter-nine-crooked-grins-sly
> 
> P.S. Important question here - do you want me to make a NSFW moodboard for this fic? Because if you ask, you shall receive! Just let me know!!
> 
> Also - featherfalls: if you still want to share that moodboard/pinterest board that you made with me I'd love to see it!!


	10. Vol X

Chapter Ten: Leprechauns, Half-Truths and Lines Drawn in Scorched Earth

 

 

 

“Come on, lassling, we don’t have all day now.”

 

 

Sweeney’s voice was almost playful and undeniably hungry as it rasped against the slope of your neck, his fevered tone a perfect match for the frenzied deftness thrumming in his long, agile fingers as they snaked beneath the waistband of your leggings to find the supple skin of your hips, his digits seeking the firm flesh of your ass with ease. Never mind that it was broad daylight in a gas station somewhere along the winding back roads of Kentucky, or that your impatient companions waiting just outside by the car had specifically warned you  _not_ to make use of the relatively clean, if not claustrophobic bathroom that the rickety structure sported to indulge in a much needed afternoon quickie. As usual, Sweeney didn't seem to give a single fuck about the opinions of anyone but himself as he pulled you against him, directing your tangled forms through the doorway of that blessed bathroom, all hints of gentleness fled from his touch, the ragged need coursing through his veins spilling into the urgent press of his fingers at your waist, the ragged rasp of his beard at your neck, his wicked curses that burnt like fire as they kissed your skin.

 

 

"Here? Now?" you groaned beneath the onslaught of his hungry mouth, unable to keep the smile out of your voice, your fingers burrowing eagerly into his hair despite the reluctance flitting about your tone, grit from rolled down windows and dust coated roads imbedded deep into the silky strands that played within your grasp. However, despite the close quarters and limited opportunities for ablution that he'd had, when you breathed him in and flicked your tongue against the warm skin of his neck all you tasted was musk and sweet fertile earth and something you supposed might be the tang of sunshine catching playfully in the flaming glint of familiar copper. Absently you marveled at that little show of his latent power, poignant awe and something dangerously similar to reverence flitting tellingly in the back of your mind in worshipful response.

 

 

"Oh come now, lassling," Sweeney hummed as he slid those deft hands hungrily from the perch of your hips, slipping them beneath your tank top, up the swells of your waist, his digits catching in the dips of your rib cage, his touch restless, like he wanted to feel all of you but for the life of him he just couldn't decide where to start, "I know what you've been keenin' for since we got just one merciful fuckin' night alone in that motel room a few hundred miles back. Let me give you what you're wanting."

 

 

It was a tempting offer, really it was, but at the moment, sleep deprived and lust drunk and a bit hungover as you were, you just couldn't get the daggers that glinted in Dead Wife's eyes, ready and waiting to be flung at a stray unsuspecting artery, out of your mind’s eye, no matter how good Sweeney's hands felt as they undid the clasp of your bra to slide eagerly up between your breasts with an impatient familiarity, a poignant comfort that you felt simmering low in your belly, tripping a spark of knowing heat to flare to life deep within you, or how fiercely your heart twisted in your chest at Sweeney's low appreciative growl, the fevered, lost sounds of his pleasure  _still_  doing heated, carnal things to you despite all the countless times you'd experienced them by now.

 

 

In retrospect, you would admit that it was those small noises of unfettered want, of utter untamable need, that would prove to be your undoing, but in the throbbing heat of the moment your lust fogged mind couldn't think of them as anything other than unbearably sexy, so in response you just sighed against his mouth, wrapped your hands more firmly about the thick coils of muscle knotting in his button down clad shoulders, and arched into his touch, glad to lose yourself, however briefly, in the virile magic of this wild, wanton male kicking the bathroom door closed with one large booted foot and messing impatiently with the lock somewhere near the handle behind him.

 

 

"It's been so long," you murmured between kisses, well aware that in any other situation you most likely would have been embarrassed by the whining need sharply edging your voice, though now, in the dimly lit, achingly private bathroom of this no-name gas station it only seemed to spur Sweeney on, to make him work harder to bring out that ragged want tripping hot and aching through your veins, swirling behind your fluttering eyelids.

 

 

"Too long," Sweeney growled as he palmed the aching heft of your breasts in each of his scopic hands, thumbs skating over your throbbing nipples, twisting and plucking in that perfect way that he knew would make you melt for him, "Too damned long. I can't go without you. I need you, _mo_ _Éin_ _í_ _n_. I need you like I need air."

 

 

Sweeney wasn't usually one to bear his godamned soul to you in the middle of intimacy, so the fragile lilt of his voice and the tentative vulnerability in his words had you pausing, stilling where you had been writhing beneath his touch so that you could sweep a soft palm along the cut edge of his jaw, cup the nape of his strong neck with gentle fingers and make him meet your gaze.

 

 

"I'm right here, Sweeney," you whispered, peppering delicate kisses along his bruised cheekbones, across the freckled bridge of his crooked nose, and you swore to Bran that Sweeney fucking  _shivered_  at the softness in your voice, the comfort lilting in your sweeping touches, "I'm not going anywhere."

 

 

"That's what I'm afraid of, lassling," Sweeney husked cryptically, his tone pleading and broken and fucking  _scared_ , and you suspected it was that same icy fear that spurned him to tighten his grip on you, his long fingers biting into the flesh of your ass hard, a snarl ripping from his throat as he clutched you to him protectively,  _possessively_ , and backed you up against the nearest surface, which happened to be the chipped porcelain sink propped up on the far wall. His lips were as scorching as a brand as they pressed against yours, his kiss morphing from fearful to needy to  _consuming_  in the space of a few heartbeats. Figures that even when being tender, your towering, virile male was still all heat and dominance and _intensity,_  such damned, throbbing, contagious intensity.

 

 

Any remaining questions about the strangeness of his words or his uncharacteristic behavior were pushed from your mind by the driving press of his hips between your thighs, that venerable, ancient, familiar slotting of limbs heating your skin wickedly as it slipped against his, parting your lips eagerly for his seeking tongue, wetting the already weeping heat of your aching cunt.

 

 

God damn you, you  _wanted_ him. The bathroom reeked of cheap bleach and unfiltered cigarettes but his hands were huge and hot and so fucking good as they slipped into your loose hair, cradled the nape of your neck, cupped your heavy breasts beneath your tank top. Dimly, through the roaring in your ears, you realized that the first time you and Sweeney had fucked it'd been in a bathroom just like this one, and you smiled into your kiss, breathless and  _excited_ , "This feels familiar."

 

 

"Aye, it does," Sweeney husked, his lips reluctant to leave yours, even for just a moment as they curved into a wicked smile, "But variety is the spice of life, lassling," suddenly his hands were wrapping low about your hips, spinning you around, then bending you at the waist once you'd regained your balance. Immediately Sweeney curved his huge chest around your bowed back, his hot mouth moving to lap at the sensitive slope of your neck, his deft tongue flicking out to trace teasingly at the delicate skin there.

 

 

" _Oh!_ " you sighed low and wanting, wetness pooling hotly in your cunt as you felt the huge press of his throbbing hardness right where you needed it, just a few thin, accursed layers of cotton and lace separating your heated flesh from his steely cock.

 

 

"Do you want me to take you like this, lassling," Sweeney crooned in that velvety impudent tone of his, a hulking devil smirking at your back, "Bent over a sink, your sweet little cunt begging for my cock?"  _Jesus_ , you could listen to this brash male talk dirty to you for  _hours_.

 

 

"Yes," you whined, straining to wiggle your hips that were wedged so tightly against his, trying desperately for even a small measure of delicious friction against the throbbing wetness between your thighs, nearly delirious with unsated lust. Sweeney, you were sure, could sense this, and you clenched your jaw hard to stem the needy moans threatening to tumble from behind your teeth as Sweeney ran lazy fingers down the notches of your spine with a casual leisure that you sure as shit didn't feel roiling in your chest, burning in your limbs, pounding at your temples.

 

 

You did moan loudly when, never one to be patient with a bounty ripe for the taking, spread out so prettily before him, Sweeney's fingers dipped suddenly into the waistband of your leggings, his digits tucking firmly into your panties, and he tugged hard, leaving both cotton and lace to settle somewhere just above your knees, the hasty, lust fueled motion exposing the bare flesh of your ass and the wet heat of your cunt to the lukewarm, Lysol scented air. That heated moan slipped urgently into a low husky groan as you felt the scopic palm of Sweeney's hand slap hard against the firm flesh of your upturned ass, the jagged motion jostling you against the cool porcelain of the sink, rocking you on the forearms you had resting there.

 

 

"I can't hold back, _mo_ _Éin_ _í_ _n_ ," Sweeney groaned as he combed a quaking hand through your hair, sweeping it back from your shoulders as he wound the supple strands around his fist, and in the space of a heartbeat you were flooded with carnal memories from that night in the motel a few hundred miles ago, when his virile, potent power had sparked hot and heavy in the air and his fingers had shifted gently, almost  _lovingly_ , against your scalp in a very similar motion to the one they were exhibiting now.

 

 

"Then don't," you sighed, want heavy in your voice as you craned your neck to give him more access to the sensitive skin of your nape and arched your spine for his hungry fingers, loving the wild growl that burst from his lips at the wanton sight.

 

 

"You're precious to me, little bird," Sweeney rasped hotly at your ear, the softness thrumming in his tone a direct contrast to the burning impatience of his long, adept fingers that you could perceive hastily undoing the clasp of his pants before they settled against your skin to spread your slim thighs as much as your tightly fit position would allow, "I want to bring you only pleasure," you gasped as you felt those wicked digits of his curl expertly against your cunt, flicking your clit in a searing sweep, dipping a knuckle in the heated wetness at your core, "Only pleasure, always."

 

 

"Sweeney!" you crooned, ecstasy flooding your limbs, coiling around your shaking thighs as abruptly he sank the throbbing length of his glorious cock into your weeping sex, the blunt head of his shaft slipping slowly and steadily into your tight, pulsating heat.

 

 

"You're mine, little bird," Sweeney growled as he nipped at the taut cords of your neck, the muscles in his free forearm rippling as he wrapped it tightly around your middle, fitting you perfectly against him, "All fucking mine."

 

 

You moaned with no care for any stray gas stations patrons milling nearby when you felt one of his broad thumbs sweeping through the wetness pooling at the apex of your sex, that wanton digit finding your clit quickly to gleefully administer an unending series of toe curling flicks that had you seeing stars dancing brightly behind your eyelids.

 

 

"I will protect you with everything I have," Sweeney's voice was a whetted tangle of heated, barbed emotion, an undulating coil of possessiveness and caring and deep, abiding,  _godly_ devotion that you felt spark like fire against your heated flesh as he began to move that thick shaft within your wet sex, "You must remember that, _mo_ _Éin_ _í_ _n_. Everything I do is to protect you."

 

 

Deeply seated, unspeakably ancient alarms were beginning to ring dimly in the long forgotten recesses of your mind, but you just couldn't give them any thought what with the gloriously familiar, cloyingly sweet ritual beginning to ignite at the joining of your bodies, at this venerable meeting of god and follower, of deity and devoted. It was a feeling, you were a bit frightened to admit, that you'd become quite accustomed to, that you'd begun to  _crave_ in the time that you'd known Sweeney, and the fervor with which your body welcomed it back had a primal sort of veneration rising like smoke in your chest, peeking out in the tightness of your grip around the porcelain sink sitting sturdy beneath you, in the slackening of your jaw at the hot, wet rasp of Sweeney's mouth against the taut cords of your neck, at the needy, mewling moans dripping from between your parted lips. 

 

 

You could do nothing but hold on, abhorrent, lusty curses falling into the heated air between you as Sweeney set that blissful driving pace your besieged body had learned to crave, the eager bucking of his strong hips between your shaking thighs, the wrenching press of one of Sweeney's gargantuan arms that was wrapped so sturdily around your waist, that strong limb snapping you back into the searing press of his demanding shaft in time to the pressing lurch of his hips, and the blissfully cool porcelain of the cracked sink playing beneath your heated, flushed skin serving as the only anchors keeping you from soaring skywards towards ecstasy.

 

 

Without warning Sweeney tugged at your hair wound so tightly in the grasp of his other hand, forcing your gaze upwards until it met his in the dusty mirror positioned just above the sink, and as he slammed that delicious shaft deep into your pliant, wanting body you saw, for the first time, what you must look like to him in this moment, deep in the throes of yet another searing ritual; a fevered worshipper panting beneath his seeking touch, a devoted follower split open wide by the perfect thrusting press of his godhead. 

 

 

A deep pink flush crept about your high cheekbones and spilled down your neck to pool just below your collarbones. Your mouth hung slightly open in a nearly silent signal of pleasure, though occasionally you'd moan in tandem with the roiling giant heaving at your back, and your panting breaths fogged up the shining glass shimmering before your eyes. But, as always,  _Sweeney_ was what really drew your attention, what with the powerful, absolute, nearly unhinged possession you saw shimmering in his calculating, aphotic gaze as it fixed on you, lingering in the deep furrows of his auburn brows, that you felt, palpable and searing, in the tightening of his iron clad grip about your body. As your gazes locked you thought you heard him husk something like, " _Don't want to ever forget you like this,_ _mo_ _Éin_ _í_ _n_ _,_ " beneath the ragged rasps of his gusting breaths, though you didn't have the mental space to deconstruct the meaning behind that strange utterance around the poignant communion, the intense ritual unfolding once more between you and the deity at your back.

 

 

That sinful thumb of his would prove to be the thing that cut those failing anchors marooned about you as it swept through the rushing wetness at your sex in a searing sweep just as Sweeney pounded his hips in a brutal thrust that rocked you  _just so_  on his shaft, and before you could do anything more than scream softly beneath him just as your body began to convulse, choke out a huskily intoned "Sweeney!" and roll your eyes back delectably in your head, you were cumming for him, unraveling blissfully in his arms, your back bowing sharply as your sex clenched powerfully in a wet, grinding rush that had even Sweeney's unfaltering hips stuttering as they slid through your searing orgasm once, twice, and then he was joining you, slamming his hips into yours hard as his beautiful shaft poured his release into your blistering sex.

 

 

Then were the familiar, comforting after shudders as you both came down from the undeniable high that your copulations always wrung from the pair of you. You felt his fingers unclenching hesitantly from around your around your waist, coming to rest wearily at your hip as he whispered praises to you in both English and Gaelic, his voice a whirling mixture of thrumming male satisfaction and elysian pride, though something that you caught whirring behind his eyes as he began to right himself had panic bubbling in your chest, gripping your throat hard as it slipped against your collar bones.

 

 

_For its favor on one side...._

 

 

You tried to push that foreign, cloying apprehension away as you straightened up, cracked your spine, but the searing kiss that Sweeney pressed to your lips and the urgent, almost fearful clutch of his hands at your hips did nothing to help that sensation shifting low and uncomfortable in your gut. 

 

 

"I meant what I said, little bird," Sweeney whispered as his lips flitted reverently over your cheekbones, down the line of your jaw as if he was memorizing its curve, as if he didn't expect to see you again in mere moments, "Everything I do is to protect you." Your heart fluttered girlishly at the sentiment, though the worldly, battle scarred portion of the weary appendage merely crossed its arms and glared, mistrustful and doubting. And then Sweeney slipped out of the dimly lit bathroom, taking his magic, his warmth, with him, leaving you to clean up the mess between your thighs as best you could, slip your panties and leggings back up the swell of your hips, and re-clasp your savaged bra. 

 

 

You were still nervous, worrying your bottom lip and furrowing your brow, as you exited the dingy gas-station, your eyes searching fervently for that splash of peeling yellow paint amongst a sea of hot rod flames and camo print rims. The downwards quirk of your brow only deepened as you failed to catch sight of the cab you expected to be waiting here, and you felt your pulse begin to race as the inconceivable idea that you had just been dumped like yesterday's trash seared brutally into your mind.

 

 

_For its favor on one side of the coin..._

 

 

Something snapped disastrously into place alongside the cogs whirring dizzyingly in your mind as you caught sight of a familiar slip of canvas that could only be your hastily backed duffel lying surreptitiously on the ground near the stations creaking chrome door and suddenly you understood; the fear in Sweeney's voice as he'd clutched you to him, the intensity in his gaze as he made love to you just moments ago, his mewling pleas that you remember his affection for you, his fevered need to protect you, his hasty, heartfelt exit and lingering, sorrowful caresses. You'd just been tossed away like week old take-out, set aside like the Senator's wife for his hot, young secretary. As you neared your bag you caught sight of a dull slip of something small and aureate, the glint of a single gold coin tossed onto the beaten canvas, and a sudden humorless, snorting laugh bubbled caustically from between your lips as soul deep, pain fueled rage exploded deep in your chest, near your ragged heart.

 

 

You'd just felt the flip side of a Leprechaun's fickle nature. And in typical fashion for one Mad motherfucking Sweeney, he had left you totally, utterly, and completely fucked.

 

 

_For it's favor on one side of the coin, and wrath on the other...._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello Lovely Readers!
> 
> I've missed you all! I am sooo embarrassed by how long it's been since I've updated, life got a little crazy there for a moment but things should calm down here as we wind into December! I can only hope that you can forgive me and enjoy this latest smutty installation in our story!! 
> 
> What were your thoughts about this chapter? Was Sweeney in character - i.e. brash, loud and unapologetic enough? Did Sweeney really need to ditch the Reader to protect her from the dangerous deities of this brave new world, or is his judgement once again, as it is prone to be, quite shitty? Was the smut intense enough, emotional enough? Did you feel the deep connection between Sweeney and the Reader that I was trying to convey? Yay for dirty, bent over a sink, smut! I'm absolute trash for Sweeney bathroom sex xD *scoots over to make room in the dumpster*
> 
> Once again, my wonderful readers, I need your input! Would you rather have a chapter featuring Sweeney and the Reader apart that explores how they deal with that, how the Reader gets back to Sweeney (because he really ditched her quite late, right before Laura cut Salim loose, and given their connection it wouldn't take much for the Reader to track Sweeney down and kick his ass) and then get to the chapter with the good angry, smutty make up action I have planned, OR just jump right into the good, angry smutty make up action in Chapter 11? A certain bunny loving, platinum haired goddess might make an appearance in that chapter, just a heads up ;) Let me know your thoughts, I'd love to hear them!
> 
> I'm sorry for the long wait on this chapter, I can only hope that it was worth it! As always, thank you for reading! <3
> 
> P.S. Moodboard for this fic!
> 
> http://imagines-oneshots-blog.tumblr.com/post/167736891169/all-that-glitters-chapter-ten-leprechauns


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